Cities have become the laboratories of democracy and the engines of economic growth. But a disengaged, miserly national …
Cities
In Town vs. Country, It Turns Out That Cities Are the Safest Places to Live
A generation of movies have made us think that the American city is an inherently dangerous place. But a new study shows that you’re more likely to die violently in the quiet countryside
SXSW: Don’t Fight City Hall—Hack It
At SXSW, learning how techies can hack their way to a better city government
Supertrees of Singapore
Featuring soaring vertical, man-made plantings called supertrees, the 133-acre Gardens by the Bay project is situated near Singapore’s financial district and aimed at showcasing the city state’s tropical locale. The gardens — …
How Chinese Babies Pay the Price for Chinese Pollution
It’s a very good thing that neural tube defects are relatively rare in the U.S., because they are very cruel conditions for a newborn to suffer. The two most common types of such birth defects are spina bifida – in which the backbone and spinal canal do not close properly — and anencephaly, in which a large portion of the brain …
The Cleanest Cities in the U.S.
A new World Health Organization report details air-pollution rates around the globe. Here are the cleanest cities in the country
The 10 Most Air-Polluted Cities in the World
Environmentalists here in the U.S. are not happy with President Obama, in part because he pulled back on a promise to tighten ground-level ozone and smog standards for air pollution. But American greens should remember: much of the rest of the world has it far, far, far worse.
That’s one takeaway from a new report by the World …
Ranking North America’s Greenest Cities
In part because we have a political press obsessed with Washington, we tend to gauge the success of climate and energy legislation only through the national lens. And the picture from Capitol Hill is deeply depressing. One party completely ignores the science of climate change and only wants to engage on fossil fuels, and that doesn’t …
The Psychology of Environmentalism: How the Mind Can Save the Planet
There aren’t a whole lot of scientific disciplines that haven’t had something to say about climate change over the years — and with good reason. When a problem is global in scale there’s a universe of specialists and subspecialists who have to pitch in to to fix it — meteorologists, chemists, geologists, physicists, zoologists, …
You Can Believe Your Eyes: Low Visibility Can Mean Higher Death Rates
Does it look like a bad day to go out for a run? Maybe a little too hazy out there? Here’s a tip: It is. Don’t do it.
A study released today by Hong Kong University and published in the journal Environmental Research has found that lower visibility due to pollution has a direct correlation with increased rates of mortality in Hong …