Tobias S. Buckell's Blog, page 49

Bike rebalancing on Citibike

In its opening months, New York City’s bike share system has found itself locked in a perpetual race against its riders — to remove bikes from fully occupied stations, and to refill stations before the supply runs dry.

Via NY Times.

So they describe dudes running around in trucks picking up bikes and moving them back and forth.

Have they thought about Task Rabbiting this shit? Like, anyone with a Citibike app who’s near a station with too many bikes gets a little glowing message on their phone t...

Jamaica: lead and crime

Kevin Drums research about a strong correlation between lead and crime seems to impact the Caribbean as well:

“When I read The New York Times writing about a 40 percent fall in Jamaica’s murder rate (it’s still very high) I naturally wondered about Kevin Drum’s lead angle. And he says it fits the pattern: From 1990 to 2000, Jamaica started phasing out leaded gasoline. From 2009 to 2013, the crime rate has fallen forty percent. In other words, Jamaica is likely starting to see the beneficial im...

Must read article: College for free? America can afford it

America already invests enough in college education that if the money were just given directly to the colleges as a per-student free education grant, everyone could go for free. It’s the complicated structure that makes it a mess (and banks parasite out in the middle). Some one actually ran the numbers, if you don’t think this is possible:

“Q. You write that free education is critical for democracy. Why?

A. As Thomas Jefferson argued, people in a democracy need to be able to understand the curr...

Interesting thoughts on meritocracy and lead

Matthew Yglesias on meritocracy and lead:

“Obviously the right response to lead and other atmospheric toxins is to clean them up. But the fact of the matter is that we’re not going to eliminate lead from the build environment next year, and we’re certainly not going to go back in time to the late 1960s and clean up the environment that today’s 45-year-olds grew up in. And though lead is very important, it’s also obviously not the only source of relative cognitive disadvantage out there (consid...

Newer SpaceX Grasshopper divert video has better angle, and more cows

This angle of the SpaceX Grasshopper test recently gives you a much better view of how cool the divert was in terms of guiding the rocket for a landing:

Plus: cows!

Hal Duncan on segregration in our pop culture and art

Hal Duncan, on segregation in our pop culture and art, a must read:

“Demand desegregation, and all this straw man bullshit is exposed for what it is. As citizens of New Sodom, what we are asking for is only the dismantling of the system’s constraints. This is not a politically correct demand for quotas. We do not want a queer character in every TV show, only to know that we are as likely to find them there as elsewhere, as likely to find them there as in reality, and not in service to the stra...

Public Transit and density multipliers getting more study, with amazing economic benefits

Density and moving people around in density is the most critical innovation and economic enabler. The city is technology, and a force multiplier. So is transit:

“Every time a metro area added about 4 seats to rails and buses per 1,000 residents, the central city ended up with 320 more employees per square mile — an increase of 19 percent. Adding 85 rail miles delivered a 7 percent increase. A 10 percent expansion in transit service (by adding either rail and bus seats or rail miles) produced a...

SpaceX Grasshopper’s Divert Maneuver

Another important step in fine control of a reusable returning rocket stage:

“SpaceX proved yesterday that their Grasshopper prototype Vertical Takeoff Vertical Landing (VTVL) vehicle can do more than just go straight up and down. The goal of the test, said SpaceX CEO Elon Musk on Twitter was, ‘hard lateral deviation, stabilize & hover, rapid descent back to pad.’

On August 13th, the Grasshopper did just that, completing a divert test, flying to a 250-meter altitude with a 100-meter lateral man...

US Army going more solar

Those leftist hippies:

“Field patrols will soon have almost weightless solar blankets as well. These will be able to capture a once unthinkable 35pc of the sun’s light as energy with thin membranes, a spin-off from technology used in satellites.

This new kit is a military imperative. Taliban ambushes of supply convoys are a major killer. The Pentagon says the cost of refueling forward bases is $400 a gallon.”

(Via Solar power to trump shale, helped by US military – Telegraph.)

h/t to Philip Brewe...

Solar install prices still getting lower

“the decline appears to be continuing apace this year, according to the researchers: ‘Within the first six months of 2013, PV system prices in California fell by an additional 10 to 15 percent, and the report suggests that PV system price reductions in 2013 are on pace to match or exceed those seen in recent years.’

Utility-scale systems are also becoming cheaper. ‘Utility-scale systems installed in 2012 registered even lower prices, with prices for systems larger than 10,000 kW generally rang...