Tags: NYC

As part of Archtober, new Zero Waste Design Guidelines were launched at the Center for Architecture on October 18. The Guidelines are an initiative of the Center for Architecture, in collaboration with the AIA New York Committee on the Environment, Kiss + Cathcart Architects, ClosedLoops, and the Foodprint Group.

In 2016, nearly every country signed the Paris Climate Agreement. The agreement requires all participating countries to take action to reduce greenhouse gas emissions in order to keep the Earth’s temperature from rising two degrees Celsius above pre-industrial levels. Two degrees might not seem like a lot, but according to NASA it’s probably the tipping point for widespread ecological problems caused by climate change.

In June 2015, Mayor Bill de Blasio signed legislation requiring the City to produce its first-ever comprehensive cultural plan for all New Yorkers. Now the NYC Department of Cultural Affairs and Hester Street Collaborative are working together to collect information to inform the cultural plan, called CreateNYC.

Freshkills Park has already seen a vigorous return of wildlife. White-tailed deer roam the grasslands, turtles nest in the salt marsh, osprey swoop over Main Creek, and muskrats leave tracks through the wetland. Now Freshkills Park can add another species to the list: bald eagle.

You may have read our recent blog post about the herd of goats that were used in Freshkills Park to clear the invasive reed Phragmites, but did you know that goats were once a common fixture in New York City?

It might be easy to imagine designating a bottle or a newspaper for recycling or reuse – but food? That is the purview of former Mayor Bloomberg’s Food Waste Challenge. Over 100 New York City restaurants have made a commitment to divert at least 50% of their food waste.