I read today that Apple is going to renovate the Chicago “El” stop across from their store. The run-down stop is in bad repair and the Chicago Transit Authority has no money to do anything about it. In exchange, Apple gets naming rights, control of ad-space in the station, and, of course, a better looking neighbor.
I am of two minds about this news. On the one hand, I think it is a unique model for municipalities (or transit authorities as the case may be) to make some much needed upgrades when our poor economy and our national attitudes don’t provide enough support and funds to do so. At the same time, I cringe at the possibility of the “Apple iPhone North Station”. We have too much corporate sponsorship already. More will dull our senses (not to mention our history and traditions).
This quote from the article sums up the problem well:
“We are selling everything, aren’t we?” says Joseph Schofer, director of Northwestern University’s Infrastructure Technology Institute. “We haven’t come to the point where we recognize how critical the system is to the economy, and provide it with long-term, stable funding.”
Its a choice we have to make as a society – “Macbook Pro Stop West” or preserving our heritage. Unfortunately, in this economy, and with the “tea-baggers” ideas getting the airtime that they do I fear we will simply sell.
The financial crisis is a tough one. Its so hard to wrap one’s head around it. I can understand any news organization having a hard time with explaining to their audiences exactly what the hell is going on. But it is interesting to me that there has been very little coverage on two points.
First is that our Federal Reserve has been dishing out loans to other National Banks around the globe to the running total (so far) of $600Billion+. It took me a while searching Google News to even find a direct note that the money was going to foreign banks :
Meanwhile, the Fed has been furiously pumping liquidity into the global banking system, extending massive amounts of credit to U.S. institutions and sharply increasing the so-called swap lines with foreign central banks to $630 billion. These provide dollars to foreign banks that desperately need them.
Think about that. It took almost two weeks and $150billion in extra pork to get enough votes to get congress to approve giving $700billion to US banks. Please, please nobody tell Sarah Palin that we are currently handing out cash to more foreigners!
The second item that is missing on the 24 channels is what’s going on in the EU. This World financial crisis is the first real one the EU has had to deal with and as such is a real test to the unification. Recently Ireland decided that it was going to insure its banks during this crisis and for future transactions. This announcement sent loads of cash into the Irish banks… out of other European ones. This morning Germany started to hint at a similar deal for its banks.
So all of a sudden these countries are making these protections but they are not consulting their EU partners to ensure that the moves protect the Union. Of course the US media doesn’t really care too much about this, but up until this morning I had not seen much on it anywhere. Today, however, the BBC did a good job questioning the unity.
I guess my point is that this crisis is truly global even if the cable news hides that. What’s truly scary is the further missing news relating to the smaller national banks from smaller countries. Especially those countries who have their own currencies but depend on US Dollars for all of their trading. The crisis is certainly hitting them now, but it is bound to ravage them in the future. As my neighbor Adam and I discussed over dinner last night, when those countries banks fail people literally starve to death.
I had some interesting conversation at a shindig last night about the planned growth for my town, Carrboro. There is a great deal of development coming to our downtown area in the next few years. All of it seems just a bit out of place until you realize how quickly our state, and the greater “Triangle” area is growing. In fact, this year N.C. eclipsed N.J. to become the 10th most populous state. And we’re still growing.
Nonetheless, I learned that two large parking lots downtown will be going away with the addition of all these new buildings. Plus, the neighborhood street-parking will be permit protected to help out the folks who live near downtown. Sooooo… considering our free buses stop running at 8pm and don’t run fully on the weekends do they expect people to patronize all this new business-tax-base?
Growth is a hard problem, but N.C.’s its getting some recognition . In fact, a friend sent me a link to a good article about N.C.’s growth problems, through the eyes of a Californian. Its an interesting perspective. One very good point the author makes is that N.C.’s growth has to be seen through the historical filter of a state moving from an agrarian society to whatever it is becoming. California skipped the agrarian step thanks to the gold rush.
Like the rest of the South, North Carolina must struggle every day with the dream of being rural and the reality of being urban. That’s what makes it increasingly difficult to keep growth good.
I think about the town I grew up in through that filter, and I suppose I see Carrboro through it as well. N.C. is not the simple place it once was. I am grateful for that, but always a little nostalgic for the old state too.
I have one thing to say about the financial crisis – ok, maybe two. First, this morning I heard a BBC reporter say that one worry today is that some banks are wondering if their valuation is as low as Bear Stearns. OK, look… you’re freakin’ BANKERS! Don’t you know what the valuation of your own business is? Have you guys been pulling our legs about being financial “experts” all this time?
Second, I find it a shame that through this whole story no one is talking about what an amazing piece of sly business JP Morgan pulled off. They bought a whole bank for $2 a share. Its one of the best deals ever and no one is even calling them “shrewd”. Isn’t this what the whole free-market thing is all about?
I mentioned that Paul Wolfowitz was in Rwanda while I was there. Ran into him in the lobby a few times – shared a plane out with him. But this tops all – he tried to stick Mark with his breakfast bill.
mah points out a headline in today’s New Times here in Rwanda: Frw44b goes to consultancy each year. That’s $80 million in money asking other people (mostly Westerners) to provide answers. That’s $80 million going to countries other than Rwanda… the country that needs the economic stimulus.
This goes right back to what I mentioned the other day about being asked point-blank about developing in open source. The reasoning there is that someone locally can learn to continue developing the system if the code is available. Of course we are taking it that one step further by hiring a local developer to join the team. Still, you get the point I hope.
Now in almost completely separate news, today I read about a solar cell phone charger that only costs $20! That’s only 10,000frw. Not much at all. The other day when I met the volunteer health workers who are going to use our systems to collect data I asked specifically where they charged their phones (all three had phones already) when they don’t have power. They told me they go to friends houses who have power. Sometimes they would charge them there at the health center too since they were affiliated with it now. Hell, for $20 we could hook them up!
