Japan

As of Saturday, Hokkaido, Japan's northernmost island, was connected to Tokyo by the newest addition to Japan's iconic Shinkansen bullet trains. The 513-mile route includes 33.4 miles in "the world's deepest operational main-line rail tunnel."

March 31, 2016 - The Telegraph

If a Seattle company gets its way, in a few years there will be 100 floating wind turbines about 15 miles off San Luis Obispo County on the central California coast, generating about 1 gigawatt of electricity.

November 14, 2015 - San Jose Mercury News

The 105-year old Hudson River Rail Tunnels may desperately need replacement, but the Federal Railroad Administration also has an eye on the future, awarding $27.8 million to prepare a maglev application between Washington and Baltimore.

November 9, 2015 - The Washington Post

The China Railway International Group, working with the Chinese Export-Import Bank, responded to the California High-Speed Rail Authority's "expressions of interest." They teamed up with China Development Bank to beat out the Japanese in Indonesia.

October 18, 2015 - Reuters

With fewer human workers available to meet demand, Japanese construction company Komatsu is turning to automated equipment and drones.

October 14, 2015 - The Verge

Better Cities & Towns gives its imprimatur to the "narrower is better" approach to lane width for traffic safety thanks to a study by Toronto transportation planner, Dewan Masud Karim, presented at the Canadian ITE annual conference.

August 12, 2015 - Better Cities & Towns

Japan has pulled the plug on an ambitious stadium plan, expected to cost $2 billion and designed by one of the world's most famous architects.

July 21, 2015 - The Guardian

Whether driveways are anti-urban or 'anti-pedestrian' depends on how we segregate street uses. As shared spaces where they cross sidewalks, driveways inform the wider question: what makes for a good street?

May 13, 2015 - Urban Kchoze

Maglev trains owned by Central Japan Railway were clocked traveling at speeds of 603 km/h, less than week after traveling 590 km/h to set a record last set in 2003.

April 23, 2015 - The Guardian

The non-partisan Eno Center for Transportation has had it with futile attempts to raise the federal gas tax and the never-ending transfers (bailouts?) from the federal general fund to keep roads and transit funded. "Pay as you go" no longer works.

December 20, 2014 - Logistics Management

The Houston to Dallas high speed rail train will be built with the cooperation of Japan's Central Railway, a longtime successful and profitable operator of Shinkansen bullet train lines. Securing the private financing is key to the project.

August 20, 2014 - The Texas Tribune

Urban Times offers a list of 13 urban river renewal projects spanning from Medellin to Manila.

June 14, 2014 - Urban Times

An intrepid blogger digs into the differences between Japanese zoning regulations and those here in the United States.

April 22, 2014 - Urban Kchoze

In order to stave off the worst climate change scenarios, experts have recommended that the world's countries must aggressively expand their efforts to limit greenhouse gas emissions. Some surprising countries are headed in the opposite direction.

November 22, 2013 - Grist

New maglev train in Japan reached 310 mph on a test track. With construction about to begin, some worry that declining population would make the project unsustainable.

September 6, 2013 - Wired

Japan's Mt. Fuji, Italy's Medici Villas and Gardens, and a historical port town in Fiji are among the 19 new additions to UNESCO's vaunted World Heritage List; bringing to 981 the number of cultural, natural, and mixed sites comprising the list.

June 29, 2013 - Los Angeles Times

With of support of leaders in Beijing, Chinese investors are making their presence known in U.S. commercial and residential real estate markets. The levels of foreign investment are reminiscent of the Japanese buying binge of the 1980s.

June 28, 2013 - The New York Times

The Telegraph compiles a list of the fastest train trips in the world, from the 90 minute journey from Brussels to Paris at 186 miles per hour to Shanghai's 268 mile per hour maglev train. A new service is poised to join them.

June 16, 2013 - The Telegraph

Apparently the kids in Japan are just too darn loud. In a country where the old increasingly outnumber the young, crotchety old folks are cracking down on the sounds of childhood.

June 7, 2013 - The Japan Times

The results of a recent study of pedestrian road crossing behavior suggests that the risks we take as walkers depend largely on our cultural context.

May 10, 2013 - Atlantic Cities