After numerous high trucks hit the roof of the tunnel or drivers continuing to enter the tunnel during a fire despite warnings lights, a new warning system has been developed for the Sydney Harbour Tunnel.
The new system uses a combination of pumped water and light projection to create a huge soft stop sign impossible to ignore.
Watch the video here.
From Core77
Fishermen at the bottom of a dam overflow in Rayong, Thailand, picture by Anan Charoenkal.
After the Great Storm of 1900 hit Galveston, Texas, the city protected itself with a seawall, and the town was raised to a new ground level. Everything was raised, houses, churches, offices, trees, gardens.
Dredged sand was used to raise the city by as much as 17 feet (5.2 m) above its previous elevation. In the seven years operation 2,156 buildings were raised on jacks, manually and with the use of mules . Catwalks were built connecting houses and buildings, and canals were dug through town to allow the dredge barges to bring in the sand.
A levada is an irrigation channel or aqueduct specific to the Portugese island of Madeira. They were created from the sixteenth century to carry water across the island from the mountainous west and northwest of the island to the drier southeast, which is more conducive to habitation and agriculture
The total levadas network extends over 2150 km in this island 57 km long, 23km wide in the widest point.
Submerged Churches.
These churches from all over the world are not victims of natural disaster, they all sit in the valley of a reservoir. Many reservoirs were created in valleys with small towns or villages nestled in them, the benefit of having reservoirs always outweighed the cost in relocating a small population. In many of these settlements the religious buildings were the tallest and once the valleys were flooded they could still be seen poking out of the water in a surreal post apocalyptic manner. Lots of them still survive, making more of an appearance every time the water level drops.
Among these examples are Ladybower, Graun, Panta de Sau, Tehri and Potosi
(via hideback)
In the early decades of the 20th Century, the New York Board of Water Supply issued songbooks full of water supply-themed songs, set to the tune of popular hymns and songs of the day. The 1913 book was specifically meant to be sung at the Celebration of the Beginning of Storage of Catskill Water.
From NYC Water
To test both structural and aesthetic concerns for their new structures in the early 20th Century , the Board of Water Supply used scale models.
From NYC Water
The FLoating Instrument Platform (FLIP) is a naval research station designed in 1962. It is towed horizontally to open water then flips vertically to provide a stable platform mostly immune to wave action.
The tilting is actioned by directing water into ballast tanks. The position is reversed by sending compressed air in the tanks. Because the bulkhead becomes the deck, the FLIP has rooms with doors mounted on the floor, portholes in the ceiling, and sinks and toilets mounted for both configurations.
Developed during the cold war, it continues to provide a uniquely stable platform for research missions that include ocean acoustics, marine mammal studies, geophysics, meteorology, physical oceanography, and laser propagation experiments.
One year ago the Elwha and Glines Canyon Dams started to be removed as part of the watershed restoration on Washington’s Olympic peninsula. It is the largest dam removal in the history of the USA.
The dam removal will restores ecosystems in the long term, it will open up the river to migrating fish for the first time in 100 years and allow the river to transport sediment throughout its reach, helping to rebuild the natural bed structure and flow of the Elwha all the way to the sea by rebuilding beaches that today are starved for sand and other fine material.
In the short term, excess turbidity remains the biggest concern during the next 3–10 years. About 600 dams have been taken down in the U.S. over the past 50 years, but none involved so much sediment (24 million cubic yards).
In the case of the Elwha, Congress authorized the dam removal 20 years ago, but it took two decades to get the money and logistical details in place.
UTEC, the University of Engineering and T echnology in Lima, Peru, has collaborated with mayo draftDCB to develop a billboard that can produce potable water from the air humidity.
Based on the same concept as Fog interception technology in our previous post.
From 123 inspiration
This visual blog presents images and projects related to the WATERSHED+ art program.
WATERSHED+ is a public art program hosted by City of Calgary's department of Utilities and Environment Protection.
WATERSHED+ aims to develop awareness and pleasure in the environment, not by changing water management practice, nor developing a uniform visual language, but rather by creating a climate of opportunity for water initiatives to build an emotional connection between people and the watershed.
WATERSHED+ presents a unique approach to public art by embedding artists and artistic practices within UEP core activities, participating as members on infrastructure design teams, contributing to project design, development of events, community education, etc.
You can visit us at:
watershedplus.ca
This program was devised by Sans façon (Charles Blanc & Tristan Surtees) with a team composed of Matt Baker, Emlyn Firth, Yan Olivares of Yes Architectes, Eric Laurier and Bert van Duin.
