Displaying items by tag: the conversation
Traditional downtowns are dead or dying in many US cities
Lunch atop a skyscraper, first published in the New York Herald-Tribune, Oct. 2 1932. Charles Clyde Ebbets
‘All that is solid melts into air’
John Rennie Short is professor emeritus of public policy at the University of Maryland. This article was originally published in The Conversation.
The hollowing out of U.S. cities’ office and commercial cores is a national trend with consequences for millions of Americans. As more people have stayed home following the COVID-19 pandemic, foot traffic has fallen and major retail chains are closing stores, and prestigious properties are having a hard time retaining tenants.
(Some Southeastern cities, like Knoxville, Asheville and Greenville have seen the opposite occur).
In May 2023 the shuttering of a Whole Foods market in downtown San Francisco received widespread coverage. Even more telling was the high-end department store Nordstrom’s decision to close its flagship store there in August after a 35-year run.
In New York City, office vacancy rates have risen by over 70% since 2019. By spring of 2023 Chicago’s Magnificent Mile, a stretch of high-end shops and restaurants, had a 26% vacancy rate.
A recent study from the University of Toronto found across North America, downtowns are recovering from the pandemic more slowly than other urban areas and “older, denser downtowns reliant on professional or tech workers and located within large metros” are struggling the hardest.
Like many U.S. cities, Portland, Oregon, is losing downtown businesses. This cuts into urban revenues and creates a perception of decline.
Over more than 50 years of researching urban policy, U.S. cities have weathered through many booms and busts. Now there is a more fundamental shift taking place. Traditional downtowns are dying or on life support across the U.S. and elsewhere. Local governments and urban residents urgently need to consider what the post-pandemic city will look like.
- whole foods
- john rennie short
- chicago’s magnificent mile
- university of toronto
- university of maryland
- nordstrom
- portland, oregon
- repurposing office space
- biotech labs
- the conversation
- hollowing out of city
- retail chain
- postpandemic retail
- store closing
- downtown retail
- urban policy
- excess commercial space
- vacant office space
- tax revenue
- zoom town
- ridership decline
- public transportation
- abandoned mall
- zoning law
- urban property market
- telecommute
- virtual meeting
8 billion people and counting in the face of climate change
Global population growth promises a drastic spike in public health emergencies
This story was originally published by The Conversation. Maureen Lichtveld is dean of the School of Public Health at the University of Pittsburgh.
There are questions that worry me profoundly as an environmental health and population scientist.
Will we have enough food for a growing global population? How will we take care of more people in the next pandemic? What will heat do to millions with hypertension? Will countries wage water wars because of increasing droughts?
These risks all have three things in common: health, climate change and a growing population that the United Nations determined passed 8 billion people in November 2022, which is double the population of just 48 years ago.
- climate change
- human population
- how many people live on earth
- the conversation
- public health challenges and climate change
- population growth
- maureen lichtveld
- university of pittsburgh school of public health
- infectious diseases
- drought
- food and water security
- extreme heat
- population growth and public health
- dengue
- malaria
- human infectious diseases
- air quality
UT prof: Dung beetle mothers protect their offspring from a warming world by digging deeper
Research from Kimberly Sheldon at the University of Tennessee suggests insect behavior is adjusting for climate change
If the TV series “Dirty Jobs” covered animals as well as humans, it would probably start with dung beetles. These hardworking critters are among the insect world’s most important recyclers. They eat and bury manure from many other species, recycling nutrients and improving soil as they go.
Dung beetles are found on every continent except Antarctica, in forests, grasslands, prairies and deserts. And now, like many other species, they are coping with the effects of climate change.
I am an ecologist who has spent nearly 20 years studying dung beetles. My research spans tropical and temperate ecosystems, and focuses on how these beneficial animals respond to temperature changes.
- dung beetle
- kimberly sheldon ut
- how will insect adjust to climate change
- climate change insect
- the conversation
- body temperature
- nesting behavior
- climate change
- manure
- nutrient cycling
- greenhouse gas emission
- brood ball
- bullheaded dung beetle
- onthophagus taurus
- metamorphosis
- offspring survival
- temperature variability
- rainbow scarab
- phanaeus vindex
- soil amelioration
- soil temperture profile
- reproductive success
- global warming
5 big threats to the world’s rivers
Human activities have imperiled our waterways — along with a third of freshwater fish and other aquatic species
This story was originally published by The Revelator.
If we needed more motivation to save our ailing rivers, it could come with the findings of a recent study that determined the biodiversity crisis is most acute in freshwater ecosystems, which thread the Southern landscape like crucial veins and arteries.
Rivers, lakes and inland wetlands cover 1 percent of the Earth but provide homes for 10 percent of all its species, including one-third of all vertebrates. And many of those species are imperiled — some 27 percent of the nearly 30,000 freshwater species so far assessed by the IUCN Red List. This includes nearly one-third of all freshwater fish.
How did things get so bad? For some species it’s a single action — like building a dam. But for most, it’s a confluence of factors — an accumulation of harm — that builds for years or decades.
- freshwater science
- threats to rivers
- the conversation
- biodiversity
- freshwater biodiversity
- what are biggest threats to rivers and water
- are dams bad
- climate change in appalachia
- threats to clean water
- tara lohan
- dam obstructions
- grazing impacts on waterways
- river democracy act
- climate change
- dams
- water pollution
- freshwater pollution
- pollution prevention
- conservation fisheries
Brutal Hurricane Ian was just one of budding global weather emergencies at the time
Evidence mounts that climate change is creating monster storms as death toll climbs in Ian’s wake
This story was originally published by The Conversation.
FORT MYERS BEACH — When Hurricane Ian hit Florida and killed at least 100 people, it was one of the United States’s most powerful hurricanes on record, and it followed a two-week string of massive, devastating storms around the world.
A few days earlier in the Philippines, Typhoon Noru gave new meaning to rapid intensification when it blew up from a tropical storm with 50 mph winds to a Category 5 monster with 155 mph winds the next day. Hurricane Fiona flooded Puerto Rico, then became Canada’s most intense storm on record. Typhoon Merbok gained strength over a warm Pacific Ocean and tore up over 1,000 miles of the Alaska coast.
- hurricane ian
- hurricane climate change
- climate change
- fort myers beach
- does climate change make hurricane worse?
- typhoon noru
- typhoon merbok
- alaska typhoon
- the conversation
- matthew barlow
- suzana camargo
- storm surge
- hurricane research
- climate change research
- monster storm
- attribution study
- storm severity
- storm frequency
- wind speed
- rain intensity
- storm intensification
- probability
- theory
- historical data
The Conversation: Climate change is muting fall leaf color
It’s just the latest way humans have altered Appalachian forests
This story originally appeared in the Conversation. Marc Abrams is a professor of forest ecology and physiology at Penn State.
Fall foliage season is a calendar highlight in states from Maine south to Georgia and west to the Rocky Mountains. It’s especially important in the Northeast, where fall colors attract an estimated US$8 billion in tourism revenues to New England every year.
As a forestry scientist, I’m often asked how climate change is affecting fall foliage displays. What’s clearest so far is that color changes are occurring later in the season. And the persistence of very warm, wet weather in 2021 is reducing color displays in the Northeast and mid-Atlantic. But climate change isn’t the only factor at work, and in some areas, human decisions about forest management are the biggest influences.
Longer growing seasons
Climate change is clearly making the Northeast warmer and wetter. Since 1980, average temperatures in the Northeast have increased by 0.66 degrees Fahrenheit (0.37 Celsius), and average annual precipitation has increased by 3.4 inches (8.6 centimeters) — about 8 percent. This increase in precipitation fuels tree growth and tends to offset stress on the trees from rising temperatures. In the West, which is becoming both warmer and drier, climate change is having greater physiological effects on trees.
My research in tree physiology and dendrochronology — dating and interpreting past events based on trees’ growth rings — shows that in general, trees in the eastern U.S. have fared quite well in a changing climate. That’s not surprising given the subtle variations in climate across much of the eastern U.S. Temperature often limits trees’ growth in cool and cold regions, so the trees usually benefit from slight warming
In addition, carbon dioxide — the dominant greenhouse gas warming Earth’s climate — is also the molecule that fuels photosynthesis in plants. As carbon dioxide concentrations in the atmosphere increase, plants carry out more photosynthesis and grow more.
- climate change in appalachia
- fall leaf color changes
- leaf season
- fall foliage in smokies
- fall foliage in appalachians
- climate change effect on leaf display
- are tree color changes happening later?
- when is good to see fall foliage in smokies
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- when do leaves change in smokies
- fall colors in smokies
- best time to see fall leaf color in east tennessee
- the conversation
- marc abrams
- penn state