http://www.spiegel.de/international/germany/0,1518,702856,00.html

By Romain Leick, Matthias Schreiber and Hans-Ulrich Stoldt

Photo Gallery: 21 Photos

AP

Germany’s rebirth following the annihilation of World War II is nothing short of a miracle. But the country’s reconstruction was not without controversy and it resulted in cities filled with modernist buildings which have not aged well. Now, a new wave of construction is underway coupled with a new desire to rebuild the old.

It was a curious procession that wound its way up the Fockeberg in the eastern German city of Leipzig in May. The participants pushed strange wheeled contraptions up the 153 meter (500 foot) hill, climbed into them and shot back down again. The event was the 19th Prix de Tacot, an annual soap-box derby that sees daredevil teams race weird and wonderful vehicles to the delight of thousands of spectators. The race has several events and a number of special prizes, including the “‘Long Live Yuri Gagarin’ Special Award,” which this year went to a team calling itself “Stag Party.” A rolling beer-garden umbrella was among the sights.

Perhaps more interesting, however, is the venue where the Prix de Tacot takes place. The Fockeberg wasn’t created by glacial erosion or tectonic movements. Rather, the hill was created entirely from rubble leftover after the bombing of Leipzig during World War II. It is a soap-box derby on the ruins of the Third Reich.

http://www.spiegel.de/international/world/0,1518,709180,00.html#ref=nlint

Restoring the Paradise that Saddam Destroyed

By Samiha Shafy

Saddam Hussein drained the unique wetlands of southern Iraq as a punishment to the region’s Marsh Arabs who had backed an uprising. Two decades later, one courageous US Iraqi is leading efforts to restore the marshes. Not even exploding bombs can deter him from his dream.

Azzam Alwash is an anomaly in Iraq, a country devastated by war and terrorism. As he punts through the war zone in a wooden boat, his biggest concerns are a missing otter, poisoned water and endangered birds. Who thinks about the environment in southern Iraq, and who is willing to risk his life to save a marsh?

http://www.economist.com/node/16481295

Asia’s alarming cities

How Asian cities are built will determine the prospects for global carbon emissions. Oh dear 

 IF YOU are the sort to worry at night about man-induced climate change, then book a stay at any of the new high-rise hotels going up on the edge of China’s big cities—start looking for them around the third ring road. When you stagger red-eyed out of bed to peer into the murky dawn, you will see rank upon serried rank of raw “superblock” developments, a mile apart, marching into the distance. You think of the emissions involved in their carbon-hungry construction, the traffic jams on the arteries tying them into the expanding city, and the new coal-fired power stations being built to light them up. And you wonder how Asia can change its habits—energy consumption grew by 70% in the ten years to 2008—before it is too late for all of us. Yet the world’s hopes of putting carbon emissions on a manageable path depend upon on how developing Asia urbanises in the coming decades. The scale is staggering. According to the Asian Development Bank, 44m people join city populations each year. Every day sees the construction of 20,000 new dwellings and 250km (160 miles) of new roads. In theory, urban living can be greener than other ways of life: people need to travel shorter distances, for instance. The practice is not so simple. Most poor people coming to the city aspire to higher standards of living and consumption. Ill-planned public transport reinforces car use. Most striking, putting up and using buildings accounts for a big part of developing Asia’s carbon emissions—perhaps 30% in the case of China, where nearly half the world’s new floor space is built each year. What’s more, the buildings do not age well. Many thrown up in the 1990s are already being pulled down and replaced. Governments acknowledge the challenge. Green codes in China mandate energy-saving standards for heating, cooling and lighting new buildings. The aim is to cut new buildings’ energy use by 65%. But many new buildings are designed first and greened later—a cheaper but less effective approach. As for the superblocks that exemplify China’s urbanisation, a dozen new ones are built every day. Yet their conceptual design is flawed, however many low-energy light bulbs they boast.

Remember Kolelinia, the crazy urban tight rope system for biking? Martin Angelov, the Bulgarian architect who created Kolelinia, has come up with yet another crazy form of urban transportation– this time it’s a backpack harness system with a network of wires strung all over the city. All you have to do is strap on the battery-powered harness, hop onto a wire and start flying around the city. It may be science fiction now, but someday this could be a reality.