Everybody loves vintage street photography, especially when it’s from New York City. Every decade has its distinctive taste; I personally love the Seventies. But what about the Nineties? Oh dear, those years! Only twenty something years ago! But can you remember what was it like on the streets of New York City?
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San Francisco’s tech companies are bringing it down, L.A.’s having trouble growing up, plus sexy cabbies, vertical cemeteries, Bloomberg’s next act, and much, much more in this week’s Urban Reads.
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New York City, also fondly known as the Big Apple, has taken yet another step in the right direction for technophiles – the city’s Internet access will be enhanced with the introduction of the largest Wi-Fi network in the country, blanketing all 95 blocks of Harlem in the process. This humongous undertaking is known as the Harlem Wi-Fi Network, and by the time it arrives at its completion, it would hold the stature of being the largest outdoor Wi-Fi network in the US. The approximate number of people being served? We are looking at around 80,000 Harlem residents, at least that is what New York City’s Mayor Michael Bloomberg mentioned in a press conference.
Best of all is, this Wi-Fi network will be free of charge to use, where it delivers speeds of at least 2Mbps. As for the area of coverage, expect it to begin from 110th to 138th streets, between Frederick Douglass Boulevard and Madison Avenue. Harlem residents can look forward to the first phase of the network’s rollout to be completed before the calendar rolls over to 2014, with the final phased touted to be completed before the second half of next year. Does this particular bit of news make you want to move over to NYC?
NYC Rolls Out Largest Free Public Wi-Fi Network original content from Ubergizmo. 
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Here’s some good news. Harlem is about to get the biggest free public Wi-Fi network in the entire country, spanning a whopping 95 blocks. Soon there won’t be anywhere in the city where you can’t get online.
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A couple of years ago we saw a map of New York City done in the style of Super Mario World. Here’s a great complement to that map, a chart of the Big Apple’s subway depicted in the same style by Robert Bacon. What’s up with Staten Island?
Here’s the official map of the subway for comparison:
Watch the video to get a closer look at the map:
Robert also made a Super Mario Bros. 3 version of the map, which is a tad easier on the eyes.
Enhance!
You can order both maps from Bacon’s shop on Ript Apparel for $25 (USD) each. He also has Mario-themed maps of Chicago on there.
[via Doobybrain]
All Over Albany recently posted this futuristic illustration of Troy, New York, drawn in 1916. The image shows Troy in the year 2016: the streets lined with streamlined buses and trolleys, the sky filled with giant airships, and a rather phallic-looking building towering over downtown.
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A canopy of clean laundry blankets a New York City block in this photo captioned "A Monday Washing." The photo was taken in 1900, long before laundromats, and became a postcard produced by the Detroit Photographic Company. [ValaAfshar]
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As of tomorrow, the longest flight in the world will shuttle passengers on a 747-400 from Sydney, Australia to Dallas, Texas. That 15-hour, 25-minute hop on board Qantas 7 may not be the lengthiest in duration, but at 8,578 miles gate to gate, it’ll lead the industry in miles flown. For a few more hours, however, Singapore Airlines’ decade-long run from Newark, N.J., to Singapore remains the record holder for both time (more than 18 hours) and distance (9,534 miles). It’s a journey that’s been on the bucket lists of the world’s most ambitious aviation enthusiasts since the city-state’s namesake airline first launched the service in 2004, and following tonight’s final jaunt, this record-setting A340-500 will touch down at Changi Airport for the very last time.
Despite this cheerless loss, it’s a spectacular time in the world of aviation. Sure, we don’t have our supersonic Concorde replacement just yet, and the Dreamliner rollout was not without significant heartbreak, but the past few years have represented a tremendous period, with banner launches from both Airbus and Boeing that will change the way we fly forever. But as with any category, aircraft manufacturing and design advances also serve to highlight the shortcomings of previous-generation products.
The Airbus A350 and Boeing 787 make massive efficiency boosts a reality, leading gas-guzzling greats like the aging A340-500 to a premature retirement. In this case, the A345’s departure from Singapore’s fleet represents not only better things to come, but also the loss of a landmark route — it’s an unavoidable compromise, and with the end in sight, I drained my frequent flier account in order to score a ticket, and set out to discover the significance of Singapore Flight 21’s retirement.%Gallery-slideshow123017%
Filed under: Transportation
Graffiti we’re going to miss, more cokehead politicians, doomed vagina stadiums, and your weekly Rob Ford report. It’s time to check in once again to see What’s Ruining Our Cities.
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In what’s being called the next Rain Room for New York, eccentric Japanese artist Yayoi Kusama is showing off her newest installations at David Zwirner gallery. Called Infinity Mirrored Room – The Souls of Millions of Light Years Away and Love Is Calling, expect these to be the must-visit installations this fall! (Translation: Expect long lines.)
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This is site is run by Sascha Endlicher, M.A., during ungodly late night hours. Wanna know more about him? Connect via Social Media by jumping to about.me/sascha.endlicher.
