Results tagged “Green” from Intelligent Travel Blog

Who says industrial companies and national parks can't be friends?  Boeing and Washington's Mount Rainier National Park certainly think they can. On Monday, Boeing presented the park with a $75,000 check to help it become more carbon neutral.

According to the Boeing Charitable Trust, the money will go toward Washington's National Park Fund and be used to fund projects like analyzing the park's vehicles to find ways to reduce emissions and to continue a visitors' shuttle that cuts down on weekend traffic. The goal is for these and other projects to reduce the park's greenhouse gas emissions by 45 percent by 2016.

This grant is in line with the goal of the Boeing Charitable Trust: funding projects that "reduce greenhouse-gas emissions, inspire environmental citizenship, and protect and restore critical natural habitat." I think this partnership is a magnificent example for other industrial giants and hope we continue to see unlikely friendships formed for the good of the earth.

[nationalparkstraveler.com]

Photo: Jeannette Kimmel

Last year, we wrote about a progressive green community with a fitting name--Greensburg, Kansas--that continues to set new standards in eco-development.

After a May 2007 tornado ravaged this town of 1,500 residents, the community voted to rebuild Greensburg as energy-efficient as possible. According to a New York Times article, community leaders' goals were to "build a sense of economic dynamism that would generate new businesses and jobs and persuade Greensburg's talented young people not to leave." 

One of the newest additions to the town, the Sun Chips Business Incubator (above), is designed to help local businesses recover after the tornado. The Business Incubator, completed in May 2009, received a LEED Platinum rating, the highest rating possible, due to its greater than 50% energy savings and innovative water reuse system.  Strategic window placement and skylights allow the Incubator to be mostly day lit, while photovoltaic panels mounted on the roof supply 10% of the building's energy needs. Water from the sinks and showers is collected and reused to flush the toilets.

Not all parking garages are created equal. For example, look to the Ballet Valet Parking Garage and Retail Center in Miami Beach, on 7th and Collins, in the heart of the Miami Art Deco Historic District.

Designed by the French firm Arquitectonica, engineered and planned by Desman Associates and constructed by McCarthy Building Companies, the structure transforms the upper levels of the garage into a hanging garden.

From PointClickHome.com:

The building includes street-level shops, a restored Art Deco façade and six parking levels concealed behind a trellised, carbon-dioxide-absorbing planting of Clusia guttifera [a flowering shrub with leathery leaves], Conocarpus erectus, var. sericeus [silver buttonwood] and Scaevola frutescans [a tropical beach shrub]. Palm trees planted along the sidewalk provide shade.

The imaginative landscaping takes some of the sting out of driving a greenhouse-gas-emitting vehicle.

UPDATE:  For more info about the Miami Art Deco Historic District, which is celebrating its 30th year on the National Register of Historic Places, and for info about their annual Art Deco Weekend in January, check the Miami Design Preservation League website here.
 
Photo by Dan Forer, courtesy of Arquitectonica

Earlier this month, Apple began to celebrate the app store's first birthday by highlighting its favorite applications and games on iTunes -- tens of thousands of which have undoubtedly changed the way people use their phones when out and about. Grist also recently compiled a list of green apps, featuring a range of green programs from one that finds the greenest tissues and paper products to one that calculates fuel efficiency. Although I've refused to buy into the iPod hype, below are some apps that have me lusting after an iPhone for hitting the streets:

• Summer fun comes hand in hand with a blistering summer sun, so some sunscreen application is in order these days. Gorgeously Green Survival Guide ($0.99) helps in selecting the right one by showing  which chemical ingredients are no-nos.
  
• For those trying to figure out where to go and what to do in Los Angeles, Greenopia (free) offers a listing of over a thousand green businesses, restaurants, and services, complete with search and mapping functions. (Don't worry, it's coming out with apps for more cities later this year.)
  
• Overwhelmed by new menus in new locations? What's Fresh ($1.99) offers a U.S. map of seasonable produce and details the local fruits and vegetables in season for fresher and greener eats.
  
• To learn more about energy used in travels, greenMeter ($5.99) measures fuel consumption, efficiency, and costs, enhanced by details on carbon footprint and consumption graphs.
  
• In the era of new media, everyone likes to be in the know whenever and where they are. Stay in tune with GreenSpot ($1.99), a topic-specific reader aggregating environmental headlines from top sources like the NYT and AP and even hosts a podcast.
  
• Alternatively, Green News Reader ($0.99) also scans our favorite National Geographic, among other sources, for news!

Got other green app suggestions? Let us know!

Forty years ago, Cleveland's river burned. Literally. The Cuyahoga River, which winds through Cleveland and Akron, was once one of the most polluted rivers in the United States, having caught fire more than a dozen times since 1868. When it burned in 1969, Time magazine described the Cuyahoga (which means "crooked river" in Iroquois) as the river that "oozes rather than flows" and where a person "does not drown but decays." Needless to say, the 1969 fire spurred environmental concerns and a plethora of environmental legislation was passed, including the Clean Water Act and the Great Lakes Water Quality Agreement.

But where is Cleveland today? According to MSNBC, Rock City still ranks among one of the most polluted cities in the U.S. (In fact, one fifth of the top 25 air-particle polluted cities are located in Ohio. Ouch.) But the city, if ever slowly, is hopping on the green bandwagon, trying to dispose of its bad rap.