Sense of the City Winner: Congrats ssales of San Francisco!

It all came down to a close race between ssales' San Francisco, sallycat's Buenos Aires, and DeborahMcCoy's Chicago tours, which between the three of them captured a full 50% of the 99 votes cast in Where's Sense of the City Challenge at NextStop.com. The winner when all was said and done late last night was ssales, a "hoop goddess and aspiring lawyer" from the City by the Bay whose tour of her town struck just the right balance between quirky sights, hotspots, and parks to grab 22 votes and earn her the top spot bragging rights and a $50 Visa gift card from NextStop.

All of us at Where would like to extend our hearty congratulations to the winner, and to thank everyone who entered and voted. It's been fun to get a sense of how you experience your cities these past couple of weeks -- and what a mix of cities it was! The Sense of the City Challenge drew 17 entries from San Francisco, Buenos Aires, Chicago, Prague, Sydney, Milwaukee, Vancouver, Gold Coast, the two Portlands (Oregon and Maine), Athens, Phoenix, Pittsburgh, Austin, and Bali.

Thanks, also, go to the folks at NextStop.com, particularly Isabel, who set this whole shindig up, and Kevin, the programmer who built the nifty widgets that have been up on the Where homepage during the contest. The widgets will stay for a few more days for anyone who wants to swing over to NextStop to check out the Sense of the City entries (though voting is now closed) and any of the other challenges that NextStop is currently running. Bon appetite!


(Photo from Allposters.co.uk, by way of NextStop.com.)

The Linkdump

Weekend Reading has been on hiatus, along with the rest of this blog, for the past three weeks. That was unfortunate, as there was a ton of great reading material online during that time. If you find yourself with some reading time over the next few days, check out some of the following posts and articles.

The art and architecture of arcologies || Lessons from those who've never seen a city || A note to the Midwest: Change or Die || Four artistic ruminations On Cities || Digital Nomads: the podcast interview || Amazing Title Award goes to "Growing Pains for a Deep-Sea Home Built of Subway Cars" || Stepsister cities: not always ugly, but usually forgotten || Tatlin's Tower as archetype || Beautiful drawings of Buenos Aires' architecture || Nigel Coates takes the stage in Milan (Yay! Where loves Nigel Coates!) || Manaugh presents erudite posts on noise pollution, cloud writing, and video game architecture || Justin Davidson on Nouvel's brillaint 53 W 53rd || A fascinating look at Sao Paulo's growing (!) traffic problem || Four conditions for exuberant diversity || When architecture is freer than the people who use it || Baghdad: feral metropolis on the dunes || Why homeownership may not be the best option || Coolest green building ever || The Earth is making music (Incredible) || Rich Florida on The Big Sort || Phototour of a "constructive riot" || A wiki route planner for urban explorers || The chronicles of an adventuresome boulder || If you still need more proof that cities are living things, look no further... || Dubai's Palm runs into big problems (Raise your hand if you're surprised) || The Bowery Boys explore the history of NYC as a video game setting || An example of "new urban hieroglyphics" || How urban nomads are changing architecture || Design as economic salvation in BsAs



(Photo from FFFFOUND! The original full-color version can be viewed by clicking the photo.)

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Apologies for the lack of Urbanffffinds last week. This week, please accept this double-shot of urban imagery goodness as a peace offering. And some more happy news: part-time employment has been secured, and regular posting will resume at Where, starting with almost three weeks of great arch&urb stuff in a hearty linkdump, tomorrow morning.

WEEKEND READING: March 8-14, 2008

Lots of good stuff this week, but Item One is a must-read for everyone.

ITEM ONE: This week marked the (unfortunately early) end of South Central Tour, a fantastic, photo-rich blog documenting an epic trip through South and Central American cities with two infamous street artists, Above and Ripo. Take a look back through the group's stops in Rio, São Paulo, Buenos Aires, Santiago, and a bucketload of other cities. (Photo credit)

ITEM TWO: Speaking of South American cities, here's a great article on the idealism, overpopulation, and developing crime problems of Brasilia.

ITEM THREE: Kazys wins for title of the week -- "Take the bus to the internet." The post doesn't disappoint.

ITEM FOUR: Another literary excerpt from Archidose, this one examining the struggle between technology and nature in architecture and urbanism.

ITEM FIVE: Space & Culture provides some great links about "desire lines."

ITEM SIX: Another eloquent commentary on how cities can be used to combat global warming. (Via Civic Nature).

ITEM SEVEN: Karrie Jacobs goes searching for the soul of Times Square, with interesting (and, of course, beautifully-written) results.

Traffic has been abnormally high lately at Where; thanks for the great week. Now you have a great weekend.

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Lots of really great transportation-related images this week. Here are some of the best...

WEEKEND READING: August 4-10, 2007

It's been humid here like you wouldn't believe this past week, but the weekend is supposed to get a bit cooler. (Note to self: stop starting every Weekend Reading post by commenting on the weather...)

ITEM ONE: The US Affordable Housing Institute's blog is both informative and hilarious. Quite a feat, hey?

ITEM TWO: Milwaukee Magazine has a great article up about the unsinkable Whitney Gould, the architecture critic who has played quite a large role in the development in Milwaukee's attitude (and thus, my own) toward design and architecture.

ITEM THREE: The headline takes care of this one - Asia's biggest slum set to turn into India's Madison Avenue .

ITEM FOUR: One Porteño's commentary on (and photos of) Buenos Aires' new $46 million, 16 block tram. Oy. (Found via the excellent Global Voices Online)

ITEM FIVE: Some good news out of New Orleans -- the city's population has reached 60% of the pre-Katrina level.

ITEM SIX: Great post this week on brain drain at the Burgh Diaspora blog.

ITEM SEVEN: In case you missed it, proposals for San Francisco's Transbay Tower from Richard Rogers (ouch), Cesar Pelli (double ouch), and SOM (actually quite good) were unveiled this week. Life Without Buildings points us to some gorgeous animations of SOM's tower and station buildings on YouTube.


That's all for now, folks. Enjoy your weekend!

(Photo from Flickr user fddi1.)