The 3rd birthday party cake was cut by Hamish Keith at noon on September 1. Attended by all those that helped the speed reduction we heard from Hamish that more needed to be done. We have had no person killed on the road since the speed reduction but people who drive need to be reminded. The speed feed back trailer will be on the road for a month. Thanks to Walk Auckland, Ponsonby Road Business Association, RTL and Auckland Transport.
Article from University of Auckland
Technology created by researchers from The Auckland Bioengineering Institute (ABI), which makes it possible to convert human movement into battery power, could in the future enable people to charge their electronic devices while they walk.
This is because artificial muscle generator technology developed by the ABI’s Biomimetics Lab can scavenge latent energy from human motion to directly power devices and put power where it’s needed.
Dr Tom McKay, Dr Ben O’Brien, Dr Todd Gisby, Associate Professor Iain Anderson and other researchers from the Lab, have been working on the artificial muscle generator technology for the past six years.
Artificial muscle, the main component of the generator, is made of a rubbery material that has mechanical properties similar to human muscle and is capable of generating electricity when stretched.
Dr O’Brien says: “The advantage that we have over our competitors is in the small and soft circuitry that we have developed which controls the artificial muscle. Previously, artificial muscle generators were seen as unpractical to power portable electronic devices because they required bulky, rigid and expensive external electronics.”
Our artificial muscle generators because of their circuitry are lightweight, inexpensive and compact so in the future they could easily be incorporated into clothing where they could harvest energy from the wearer’s movement, he says.
“It means that people would not have to worry about the batteries on their portable devices dying out and because it would reduce the number and size of batteries required, it would mean less batteries ending up in our landfills.”
Several international companies are interested in the Biomimetic Lab’s artificial muscle generator technology and in March this year the research was named runner-up in the Excellence in the Field of Environmental Technology Research category at Monaco’s CleanEquity investment conference.
The CleanEquity Monaco 2012 conference, sponsored by Prince Albert II, was conceived to accelerate cleantech innovation and implementation and provide expert intelligence on emerging clean technologies.
Read the article in The Guardian
City mayor behind Paris Plages wins fight to pedestrianise large sections of 1960s expressway on left and right bank
It’s the latest battle in Paris’s war on the private car: a pedestrian “reconquest” of the banks of the Seine.
After a slanging match with the right, the city’s Socialist mayor, Bertrand Delanoë has won his quest to break up the two-lane urban motorway that has run along the edge of the Seine since the 1960s, and return Paris’s riverside world heritage sites to walkers and cyclists.
From next month, a stretch of more than 1km (0.6 miles) on the right bank near the Hôtel de Ville will see the first narrowing of the road to make way for pedestrian corridors, riverside walkways, bars and cafes. Then in the spring the final promised masterpiece of pedestrianisation will be unveiled: a 2.5km car-free zone on the left bank, between the Musée d’Orsay and the Pont de l’Alma, with a riverside park, pedestrian promenades, floating botanic gardens, flower-market barges, sports courts, restaurants and even perhaps an archipelago of artificial islands.
The pedestrianisation of one of Europe‘s most picturesque urban riversides means the death knell for the Seine’s non-stop riverside expressways. These were the pride of Georges Pompidou in the 60s when France’s love affair with the car was at its height. Opened in 1967 by him, under the slogan “Paris must adapt the to car”, the dual carriageway with perhaps the best view in France allowed a speedy crossing of Paris from west to east. But environmentalists have long complained it was a dreadful, polluting waste of architectural heritage.
Delanoë promised his new scheme would “give Parisians back their river”, “profoundly change” the city and provide “an opportunity for happiness” for residents. But the mayor, who will not stand for re-election in 2014, also has an eye on his legacy, seeking to be remembered as the man who finally ended Parisian reverence to the car. He has expanded cycle routes and introduced the city’s famous short-term bike-hire and car-hire schemes.
The limiting of cars along the river was foreshadowed by his Paris Plages project, an annual “urban beach” along the Seine which began a decade ago and has been much imitated across Europe. It sees the expressway closed for a month in summer while Parisians reclaim the riverside to put their feet up on giant deckchairs along an artificial stretch of sand with potted palm-trees.
But the pedestrianisation has not been without controversy. This year, the then right-wing prime minister, François Fillon, who was im the running to become a Paris MP and reportedly harboured mayoral ambitions for 2014, announced the state was vetoing the project on the grounds that it was badly thought-out. Delanoë hit back at what he called an electorally inspired, government “diktat” that went against Parisians’ interests. Motorists also complained that traffic in Paris would be hugely upset, with drivers forced to clog alternative routes across the city. Around 2,000 cars an hour use the left-bank expressway during rush hour, according to City hall which argues that motorists would see only six minutes added to their journey under the plans.
The €40m (£31.4m) project was given the go-ahead last month after the new Socialist prime minister, Jean-Marc Ayrault, lifted the block imposed Fillon.
