Galen Lawson, EMBARQ’s print designer from Communications Visual, passed along this neat film about an advertising campaign in Sweden which urged drivers to step out from behind the wheel and take the bus.

A pedestrian street in Oaxaca. Photo by EReker.

The Center for Sustainable Transport Mexico, a member of the EMBARQ network, needs your help.

By voting for its proposal to launch a sustainable transport and urban planning network throughout Mexico, you can help us make Mexican cities better places for pedestrians, cyclists, and mass transit riders.

To vote, all you need to do is click this link, choose “Support It!” in the upper right hand corner, and fill in the left side of the pop-up box with your name, email and a password.

It’s quick, easy, and simple.

To learn more about the project, click here.

To learn more about the Center for Sustainable Transport Mexico, click here.

Suburban sprawls California style. Photo by pbo31.

In September, California Governor Arnold Schwarzenegger signed into law a piece of ground breaking legislation promoting transit oriented development in the state. The Bil, SB 375, focuses on reducing green house gas emissions by changing land use patterns. While cities like San Francisco offer dense, walkable communities to their residents, many Californians live in sprawling suburbs where cars are essential for accomplishing the most basic task outside the home.
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Lee Schipper, a blogger for TheCityFix, talks about the future of mobility and movement in this podcast by EarthSky.

That’s the number of miles American’s have shaved off their driving total between November 2007 and May 2008.

Shanghai - Cycles from Lrock on Vimeo.

A street in London built on a human scale. Photo by dnlb2.

The BBC has run a piece by Dermot Finch, the director of Centre for Cities, which argues that UK cities have a lot to teach their Trans-Atlantic neighbors on subjects such as suburban sprawl and traffic. Finch’s argument is broken into four categories:

• Tackling Gridlock
• Keeping Town and City Centers Alive
• How to Beat Suburban Sprawl
• Lavishing Attention on Cities

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People In Mexico City Losing Their Sense of Smell. Produced by theEMBARQ Network on Vimeo.

Rhys Thom and I recently visited Mexico City where we met with two researchers at UNAM - Mexico’s National University - who are doing some fascinating research. Robyn Hudson, a charismatic professor, originally from Australia who has been living in Mexico City for quite some time, and her colleague Marco Guarneros, a fellow biomedical researcher, conducted a study comparing the ability of Mexico City’s residents to detect certain smells, with the ability of people living in a Tlaxcala, a neighboring town. Mexico City and Tlaxcala are similar in many respects - they share a similar culture and climate, situated high in the mountains of Mexico. But there is one crucial difference: Mexico City has much higher levels of air pollution.

When compared to their neighbors, people living in Mexico City need higher concentrations of a smell in order to identify it, a clear indication that their sense of smell is deteriorating.
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Photo by POPOEVER.

The New York Times reports today that the Hummer, that vehicle which has drawn the wrath of environmentalists and spawned websites like FUH2, might become a thing of the past. That’s because gas prices are now hovering around $4 a gallon in the United States - still a far cry from Europe, where they can be as high as $10 - making gas guzzling vehicles like the Hummer less attractive to consumers feeling the pinch of high fuel prices. As the Times reports, GM is “…considering selling its Hummer brand, an emblem of the megavehicle. Rick Wagoner, G.M.’s chairman, explained the moves by saying that he thought the shift toward more efficient cars was “by and large, permanent.””