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How Smart Is Your City?

July 14, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
greenliving, planning, smartercities, transit, transportation, urbanism

Last week, Time magazine asked, "Why Are Southerners So Fat?" There's no simple answer, of course. Poverty, culture and climate all play a role in the South's high obesity rates. But one factor that's increasingly blamed by everyone from medical...continued

Urban Hawks Take Flight on New York's Upper West Side

June 24, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
bicycling, birds, hawks, newyorkcity, parks, smartercities, wildlife

Reason No. 137 that I love commuting by bike in New York City: I get to watch baby hawks go to flight school. Last year, I was fascinated and then heartbroken by a pair of red-tail hawks that built a...continued

Good Fish, Bad Fish: Is Your Favorite Seafood Unhealthy for the Planet?

June 8, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Health and the Environment , Reviving the World's Oceans

Tags:
food, health, healthyoceans, overfishing, seafood, worldoceansday

When I was growing up, my family lived in New Orleans for several years, on the north shore of Lake Pontchartrain. One of my father's friends had a boat, and he liked to take it out shrimping. My dad and...continued

Planning for School Growth Should Be Elementary

June 3, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
charlotte, newyorkcity, planning, schools, smartercities, smartgrowth, urbanism

New York magazine featured a great story last week on school overcrowding in Manhattan. What struck me -- aside from concerns about how my own kid might fare -- was this passage about the city's failure to anticipate that New...continued

Bike to Work Day: Motivation for Getting Back on the Bike

May 14, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
bicycling, commuting, health, pollution, smartercities, smartgrowth, transportation

Tomorrow is National Bike to Work Day, which is part of National Bike Month, coinciding with Bike Month NYC here in the Big Apple, and I have to admit that it's all making me feel a bit guilty. Last summer,...continued

Here's What Earth Day Means to You

April 22, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
climatechange, earthday2009, future, globalwarming, takingaction

Earlier this month, I asked readers in my blog, on NRDC's Facebook page and via our online newsletter to share what Earth Day means to them. And you did! Here are some of the responses that made me laugh, smile...continued

What Does Earth Day Mean to You?

April 8, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
climatechange, earthday2009, future, globalwarming, takingaction

Here's what it means to me: That's my new son, Henry. (Sorry, I can't help showing him off a little bit.) I've cared about the environment for a long time, but while my wife was pregnant with Henry here, I...continued

NBA and NRDC Team Up for Green Week

April 1, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
basketball, greeningadvisor, greenliving, NBA, robertredford, sports

My March Madness bracket is in shambles. This weekend's Final Four games will be a terrible reminder that -- for the first time I can remember -- I failed to pick even one team correctly. But at least I've got...continued

New Report Says U.S. Birds in "Widespread Decline," Need Help

March 20, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Saving Wildlife and Wild Places

Tags:
biogems, birds, borealforest, canada, climatechange, conservation, dirtyfuels, newyorkcity, tarsands

Last spring, I found myself entranced by a pair of red-tail hawks building a nest in Riverside Park, just a few blocks from my apartment in New York City. Unfortunately, despite the efforts of their parents and the best wishes...continued

Don't take your drinking water for granted on this World Water Day

March 18, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Curbing Pollution , Health and the Environment

Tags:
catskills, cleanwateract, drinkingwater, naturalgasdrilling, newyorkcity, smartercities, waterpollution, worldwaterday

Where does your drinking water come from?Natural historian Sidney Horenstein has been asking that question around New York City for decades. The answer he always gets is: "From the faucet."This Sunday, however, is World Water Day, an event created by...continued

Will New York City survive sea-level rise?

February 18, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably , Solving Global Warming

Tags:
adaptation, floods, globalwarming, greenliving, newyorkcity, sealevelrise, smartercities, subways

Sometimes in New York, you get surrounded by steel and glass and brick and brownstone and it's easy to forgot that you live on an island -- and not a particularly big island at that.Then it pours for one afternoon...continued

What can a giant prehistoric snake teach us about climate change?

February 6, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Solving Global Warming

Tags:
climatechange, giantsnakes, globaltemperatures, globalwarming, paleontology, titanoboa

The snake discovered recently by scientists in Colombia was huge: as long as a school bus and heavy as a small car. Its remains, now being studied at the University of Florida, are about as long as a T-rex...continued

Steelers celebrate Super Bowl win in organic T-shirts

February 2, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably

Tags:
MLB, NFL, organic, renewableenergy, sports, steelers

I'm a huge Pittsburgh fan, so I don't need any extra motivation to celebrate last night's thrilling Steelers victory. (You've heard of tennis elbow? Today I'm suffering from Terrible Towel elbow.) If for some reason you were rooting for the...continued

I was a victim of the peanut butter recall

January 30, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Health and the Environment

Tags:
bushadministration, FDA, foodsafety, health, localfoods, monitoring, peanutbutter, simplesteps

Yesterday, my wife forwarded me an "Important Announcement Regarding Your Recent Purchase of Peanut Butter" that she got from Fresh Direct, the online grocery service here in New York City.This was not a good e-mail.As my wife will tell you,...continued

Obama administration backs smart growth (he should check out our new web tool)

January 21, 2009

Posted by Scott Dodd in Living Sustainably , Solving Global Warming

Tags:
bicycling, changeinwashington, livablestreets, neighborhoods, obama, planning, smartgrowth

Everyone seems to be having fun reading the revamped whitehouse.gov website today and seeing what it says about their top priorities.After writing about the challenges of communicating smart growth earlier today, I was curious what the new Obama administration would...continued

Scott Dodd
Scott Dodd
Website Editorial Manager
New York City
In 12 years as a newspaper reporter, I covered everything from hurricanes to highways to...
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