Xmas Party
December 18, 2010
Bayside, New York
watch the videos...
The Volt-Trons
The Great Mechanicals
The AC-DC
The Rudell Lightnings
The Master Builders
The Rudell Kids
The O.F.F. Tandem
more presentations...
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The Hydro Newscast with Marla Barnes
renewableenergyworld.com
New York Knicks @ Madison Square Garden
New York Knicks from Aligzandr on Vimeo.
New York Knicks vs Toronto Raptors
Madison Square Garden
December 8, 2010
New York Knicks vs Toronto Raptors
Madison Square Garden
December 8, 2010
Russian billionaire spends $400 million on island-based art museum project
By Zachary Roth, Yahoo!News
A Russian oligarch has paid almost $400 million as part of an ambitious plan to create an art museum and commercial center on an island in the heart of St. Petersburg.
Roman Abramovich is buying an array of crumbling buildings on St. Petersburg's New Holland island, a former military base, reports the Daily Telegraph. The self-made steel and investments magnate, whose fortune is estimated at around $12 billion, plans to convert the 18th-century warehouses into art galleries, housing, retail and hotel spaces, according to a spokesman.
Abramovich, 45, is best known in the West as the owner as Chelsea F.C., the London-based soccer club that he has helped turn into a European powerhouse over the last decade with a slew of high-profile signings. But since taking up with his girlfriend, art-world darling Daria Zhukova, in 2007, he has also become a leading collector of contemporary art. On a 2008 trip to New York, he spent $68 million on Francis Bacon's "Triptych" and $27 million on a Lucien Freud painting. Those big-ticket purchases are fueling speculation that the planned new art gallery could be intended as a home for his collection.
Zhukova, the 29-year-old daughter of a Russian oil magnate, runs her own gallery in Moscow, and is a member of the board of trustees of the Los Angeles County Museum of Art.
Last year, Abramovich bought an $85 million estate on the Caribbean island of St Barts. He also paid a reported $474 million for the world's biggest yacht, Eclipse. Naturally, it's said to have its own art gallery aboard.
More U.S. Rail Funds for 13 States as Two Reject Aid
By Michaek Cooper, New York Times
Published: December 9, 2010
Ohio and Wisconsin’s loss of $1.2 billion in federal stimulus money for rail projects will be California, Florida and 11 other states’ gains, federal officials said on Thursday.
Ohio and Wisconsin were among the biggest winners of federal stimulus money this year to build new rail lines in their states; officials in both states had lobbied aggressively for the money in the hopes that it would create thousands of jobs and improve their transportation systems.
But that all changed last month when both states elected Republican governors who vowed to kill the train projects, arguing that they were boondoggles that would leave their states on the hook for subsidies each year to operate the trains.
Now both states, which have been hit hard by the economic downturn, are losing the money. The federal Department of Transportation announced Thursday that it was taking back the $810 million that had been awarded to Wisconsin to build a train line from Milwaukee to Madison, and the $385 million that was awarded to Ohio to build a train line linking Cincinnati, Columbus and Cleveland. The money will be redistributed to 12 other states, with the biggest winners being California and Florida, which are building high-speed trains.
“High-speed rail will modernize America’s valuable transportation network, while reinvigorating the manufacturing sector and putting people back to work in good-paying jobs,” Transportation Secretary Ray LaHood said in a statement announcing the redistribution of the rail money. “I am pleased that so many other states are enthusiastic about the additional support they are receiving to help bring America’s high-speed rail network to life.”
Neither Ohio nor Wisconsin were getting high-speed trains. They were simply getting new train routes that the federal government hoped would form the basis of a new national network of trains, which could eventually be upgraded to high-speed rail. But the new governors-elect questioned who would ride the new, not-terribly-fast trains.
Scott Walker, the governor-elect of Wisconsin, who vowed to stop the train in a campaign commercial, said that the train from Milwaukee to Madison would cost too much money, take the same amount of time as driving and leave many passengers needing cars anyway to get around at both ends.
Mr. Walker worried that the new $810 million train route would leave the state with subsidies of $7 million to $10 million a year to run the trains. Exasperated train supporters, who saw a lucrative jobs project and an environmentally friendly way to travel, complained that Mr. Walker’s position was analogous to turning down a free new car, simply because it would cost money for gas and insurance.
John Kasich, the governor-elect of Ohio, declared “this train is dead” after being elected, and mocked the slow speeds the train was expected to travel.
Both men expressed interest in using the stimulus money to fix and maintain highways and roads in their states instead. But the money was part of $8 billion in the stimulus bill that was directed for building trains and paving the way for high-speed rail in the United States.
Now they are about to find out if the electorate that supported their antirail platforms will still support them, now that it has cost their states $1.2 billion.
This fall, Gov. Chris Christie of New Jersey, a Republican, killed a long-planned commuter train tunnel under the Hudson River that had received pledges of $3 billion from the federal government. He cited concerns about the strapped state’s share of the project’s rising costs. Now the federal government is weighing how to redistribute that money to other transit projects, and has asked New Jersey to return the approximately $271 million already spent on the project.
The biggest winners of Ohio and Wisconsin’s money were California, which will receive another $624 million on top of the nearly $3 billion it has received so far toward the construction of a high-speed train from Los Angeles to San Francisco, and Florida, which will get another $342 million on top of the roughly $2 billion it has received to build a high-speed train between Orlando and Tampa.
Florida’s governor-elect, Rick Scott, a Republican, has said he would take another look at the numbers to see if that train is still viable — at only 84 miles, the route is not considered long enough by many rail experts to be optimally served by high-speed rail.
The other states that will get Ohio and Wisconsin’s money will be Washington, which will get up to $161 million; Illinois, which will get $42.3 million; and Indiana, Iowa, Maine, Massachusetts, Missouri, New York, North Carolina, Oregon and Vermont, which will all get less than $10 million.
Wisconsin will be able to keep about $2 million for work on its Hiawatha line, which Governor-elect Walker has said he supports.
China’s $62-billion river diversion project might be the next Great Wall
I suspect that when the plans for the Great Wall of China were presented to the then Emperor of China, Qin Shi Huang, he might have remarked at the audacious approach chosen by the engineers. Back then the idea for the wall was to simply fortify their expanding territory, an effort which culminated in the creation of one of the most remarkable world wonder. This time around, engineers are faced with an equally ambitious project albeit with a different set of challenges. The challenge is to reroute some of the country’s waterways and direct them to Beijing. Ambitious? Yes. Practical? Apparently so, given that the communist party appears to have staked enormous prestige on the success of the project, and even allocated a hefty price tag of $62-billion.
The project traces its origin to a comment made in 1952 by Chairman Mao who reportedly proposed that since there was “a lot of water in the south, but not much in the north,” then they could “borrow some, then everything would be OK.” In simple terms, the completed project will channel water from the flood plains of China’s south and the snow-capped mountains of the west all the way to Beijing.
Scope of the project
The project encompasses three major components: The 885-mile eastern line from Hangzhou to Beijing, which mostly follows the route of the Grand Canal and is hoped to be ready by 2013. The middle line, which is supposed to open in 2014, runs 766 miles, although it might be extended. The western section, which is still in the planning stages, would funnel water from the Tibetan plateau. But with serious cost overruns and delays on the eastern and middle routes, there are doubts about whether the third line will be built at all.
Challenges
It is clearly obvious that such a project carries a sizable number of challenges. Nevermind the obviously complicated hydrology and ecological factors, the project has faced objections from environmentalist and preservationists alike. According to one pro-democracy activist, “the project is robbing the water of the rest of China to supply Beijing.”
Objections aside, the project is flowing along as planned.
engineeringdaily.net
NJ gov says he'd consider helping fund subway link
Associated Press
TRENTON, N.J. — Gov. Chris Christie, who halted construction last month on a new commuter rail tunnel between New Jersey and New York City, said Monday that he would consider contributing to a cheaper alternative: extending New York's No. 7 subway line under the Hudson River to New Jersey.
Speaking on Millennium Radio's "Ask the Governor" program Monday night, Christie said extending the No. 7 line from Manhattan through Hoboken and onto Secaucus is "a much better idea" than the tunnel that was the nation's most expensive public works project.
Christie scrapped that project because of potential cost overruns, forfeiting $3 billion in federal funds that had been approved. New Jersey could be on the hook to repay the federal government $350 million already spent.
Christie said he hadn't yet spoken with New York Mayor Michael Bloomberg about the proposal. Policymakers in Bloomberg's office have been discussing whether it would be possible to extend the line.
"This is an example of what can happen when you decide to take a strong, principled stand on something," Christie said. "If something is necessary, people find other ideas that are more equitable."
Christie said the proposed subway extension has three points in its favor: It would be cheaper than the scrapped tunnel, it would connect to Penn Station and Grand Central Station and would have funding from New York City and state.
He then chided Sen. Frank Lautenberg for not speaking up on behalf of the new idea. Lautenberg helped secure federal funding for the rail tunnel.
The $8.7 billion project to construct a second rail tunnel between New Jersey and New York was 15 years in the making when Christie killed it Oct. 27. Former Gov. Jon Corzine broke ground on the project amid his re-election campaign against Christie. Christie later accused the former governor of rushing the start of the project for political gain; Corzine said he was creating jobs.
New Jersey was expected to shoulder $2.7 billion of the costs, plus overruns. The federal government and the Port Authority of New York and New Jersey had each committed $3 billion to the project.
Before the most recent idea goes anywhere, it would need support from Christie, Bloomberg, who's an independent, and New York Gov.-elect Andrew M. Cuomo, a Democrat. U.S. Sen. Charles E. Schumer, D-N.Y., offered his support in obtaining federal funds to make the idea work.
Inspired by the "Cash Cab" post, I looked for more trivias. This set of 15 questions is a mixture of greatest engineering achievements of the 20th century and architecture 101. Just imagine, you are one of the contestants in the popular game show "Who Wants To Be A Millionaire" but with no 50/50 or lifelines. Now, take a seat and test your general knowledge.
Question 1:
The Baroque period of architecture is characterized by vivid colours, luxurious materials and elaborate surface textures. Which of these buildings is an example of typical Baroque architecture?
A. The Royal Scottish Academy
B. Lincoln Memorial
C. Solitude Palace
D. St Peter’s Basilica
Question 2:
When a client complained that the roof in his building leaks, this famous architect who had designed the building replied: ‘That’s how you can tell it’s a roof’. Another work of his was the Guggenheim Museum in New York.
A. Frank Owen Gehry
B. Frank Lloyd Wright
C. Michael Graves
D. Aldo Rossi
Question 3:
This invention by Karl Benz in 1886 revolutionized the world of transportation and soon became the main means of transport globally.
A. Airplane
B. Automobile
C. Ship
D. Train
Question 4:
Sharply pointed spires, stained glass and pointed arches are typical for this architecture style. It is mainly associated with cathedrals and other religious buildings.
A. Gothic
B. Rococo
C. Neo-Grec
D. Art Nouveau
Question 5:
There are seven tall buildings in Moscow, regarded as typical examples of Stalinist Architecture. What are these similarly designed buildings referred to?
A. ‘Stalin’s Seven Wonders’
B. ‘Stalin’s Seven Sisters’
C. ‘Stalin’s Seven Brothers’
D. ‘Stalin’s Seven Giants’
Question 6:
The groundbreaking design of this building was created by Danish architect, Jorn Utzon. It is located by the sea, and its roof resembles white sails.
A. La Scala
B. Carnegie Hall
C. Metropolitan Opera
D. Sydney Opera House
Question 7:
The construction of this famous building was completed on November 1st, 1800. It was designed by Irish-born architect James Hoban, who was inspired by the Leinster House in Dublin.
A. Williams Tower
B. The White House
C. The Chrysler Building
D. Federal Hall
Question 8:
This invention was first used in 1969 at UCLA as a means of communication between engineers and scientists associated with academics or government. It was not available for public use until the 1990’s.
A. E-mails
B. The Telephone
C. Two-Way Radio
D. The Internet
Question 9:
The invention of the internal combustion engine greatly increased the demand for which natural resource?
A. Coal
B. Petroleum
C. Natural gas
D. Water
Question 10:
The first use of air conditioning for personnel comfort was in 1902, in which New York City building?
A. Metropolitan Life Tower
B. Empire State Building
C. Woolworth Building
D. New York Stock Exchange
Question 11:
This architectural term, which refers to a free-standing bell-tower, comes from Italian and means 'a high bell tower'.
A. Triforium
B. Campanile
C. Mensole
D. Cellula
Question 12:
In 1908, this city became the first in the United States to institute chlorination of its water. Prior to this the death rate due to water born diseases, such as typhoid fever and cholera, were extremely high.
A. Boston, Massachusetts
B. Chicago, Illinois
C. Jersey City, New Jersey
D. New York City, New York
Question 13:
This Spanish architect designed La Sagrada Familia, one of the most famous buildings in Barcelona.
A. Antonio Gaudi
B. Mario Botta
C. Carlo Scarpa
D. Alvar Aalto
Question 14:
In 1895, this German physicist invented the use of electromagnetic radiation to take images of bones and organs inside the human body, which later led to the invention of the X-Ray Machine.
A. Paul Lauterbur
B. Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen
C. Godfrey Newbold Hounsfield
D. Peter Mansfield
Question 15:
In 1955, Borax III became the first nuclear power plant to utilize nuclear fission to supply an entire town with electricity. Which town was that?
A. Owego, New York
B. Avila Beach, California
C. Arco, Idaho
D. Hahnville, Louisiana
ANSWERS:
1. St Peter’s Basilica. The dome of St Peter's Basilica was designed by Michelangelo.
2. Frank Lloyd Wright. Among Frank Lloyd Wright’s most notable projects are the Guggenheim Museum in New York and the Price Tower in Oklahoma. He is also famous for developing the prairie style of architecture in Chicago.
3. Automobile. Karl Benz is credited with the invention of the modern automobile, powered by a gasoline engine.
4. Gothic. Gothic architecture flourished from the 12th century onward. Some of the examples of Gothic architecture are Notre-Dame Cathedral in Paris and The Teutonic Knights Castle of Malborg.
5. ‘Stalin’s Seven Sisters’. Stalinist architecture is a term used to characterize the period from 1933-1955. The seven tall buildings were built in 1950s.
6. The Sydney Opera House is surrounded by water on three sides. It was intended to look like a giant sailing ship.
7. The White House. During the War of 1812 the British burnt the President’s House. It was rebuilt in 1819 and was painted white to hide the fire-blackened walls. That is how it came to be called the White House.
8. The Internet. The first TCP/IP wide area network started operating by January 1, 1983. In 1995 the network was opened to commercial interests.
9. Petroleum. Prior to this invention the main use of refined petroleum (crude oil) was for kerosene used in oil lamps.
10. New York Stock Exchange. Engineer Alfred Wolff designed the central cooling system for the building. This first air conditioner only controlled temperature. Later in 1902 Willis Carrier, invented the first electric air conditioner, which controlled both temperature and humidity.
11. Campanile. The most famous campaniles are the Leaning Tower of Pisa and St Mark’s Campanile in Venice.
12. Jersey City, New Jersey. This was the start of the municipal water treatment. Since then water treatment methods have improved further to supply homes with clean safe water.
13. Antonio Gaudi (1852-1926) was born in Catalonia, Spain. His major works include Casa Mila, Casa Baltto and Casa Vicenc.
14. Wilhelm Conrad Röntgen The X-ray machine was one of the first medical equipments used to diagnose conditions of the human body. It sparked a revolution in medical diagnostic tools and led to the invention of CAT Scan and MRI.
15. Arco, Idaho.The discovery of nuclear fission resulted in a new and powerful source of energy. Borax III supplied the town of Arco, Idaho with 2 hours of electricity.
By Carol A. Metzner
President, The Metzner Group, LLC and
Managing Partner, A/E/P Central, LLC home of CivilEngineeringCentral.com
One of my favorite television viewing pleasures is Discovery Channel’s CASH CAB. Host Ben Bailey asks passengers in a New York taxi to answer trivia questions on their way to their destination. Those passengers have a chance to win money for each correct answer. Sorry, we won’t be offering cash rewards to our readers BUT do take a break and try to answer some civil engineering trivia questions! If interested, we can do future civil engineering trivia contests. Send me questions and answers that you think can “stump the chumps!” BIG shout out to Jason Vaughn PE who was great to contribute a majority of questions and answers for our test. Let us know how you do! Ready, set, go…
QUESTIONS
1. What famous engineer has the most U.S. patents and how many?
2. Who is “the father of Soil Mechanics?”
3. Name one of the two engineers elected U.S. President?
4. When water flows through a full pipe, the water is fastest in what part of the pipe? The top, middle, bottom, or all the same?
5. What caused the Tacoman Narrows suspension bridge collapse in 1940?
6. Why do golf balls have dimples?
7. What is the longest natural bridge?
8. Why don’t railways use suspension bridges?
9. What was the world’s worst accidental oil spill?
10. What is the longest street in the world?
ANSWERS
1. Thomas Edison – 1,093
2. Karl Terzaghi
3. Herbert Hoover and Jimmy Carter
4. Middle. The edge of a pipe has friction. The friction slows down the water in contact with it. Therefore, the middle is the fastest.
5. The wind.
6. The dimples reduce drag and allow the ball to travel farther than a smooth ball.
7. Rainbow Bridge, tucked away among the rugged, isolated canyons at the base of Navajo Mountain, Utah, USA. It is a natural wonder. From its base to the top of the arch, it reaches 88,4 m (290 ft) – nearly the height of the Statue of Liberty – and spans 83,8 m (275 ft) across the river. The top of the arch is 12,8 m (42 ft) thick and 10 m (33 ft) wide.
8. Suspension bridges are too flexible.
9. Supertankers Atlantic Empress and Aegean Captain collided off Trinidad and Tobago on July 1979; 90 million gallons of oil ended up in the Caribbean.
10. Toronto’s Yonge Street is listed as 1,178 miles (1,896 km) in length — roughly the distance from San Diego, California, to Seattle, Washington.
As the United States and China battle over the finer points of currency manipulation at the G-20 summit, American negotiators may want to take note of this startling testimonial to the productivity of Chinese workers: A construction crew in the south-central Chinese city of Changsha has completed a 15-story hotel in just six days. If nothing else, this remarkable achievement will stoke further complaints from American economic pundits that China's economy is far more accomplished than ours in tending to such basics as construction.
Meanwhile, it's easy to imagine the disorientation of Changsha residents who'd gone away, or who just hadn't recently ventured into the downtown neighborhood of the new Ark Hotel: "Honey, I don't remember a hotel there, do you?"
The work crew erected the hotel -- a soundproofed, thermal-insulated structure reportedly built to withstand a magnitude 9 earthquake -- with all prefabricated materials. In other words, a crew of off-site factory workers built the sections, and their on-site counterparts arranged them on the foundation for the Ark project.
Despite the frenetic pace of construction, no workers were injured -- and thanks to the prefab nature of the process, the builders wasted very few construction materials. Below is a time-lapse video that shows the hotel being built from the ground up in less than a week:
Yahoo!News
The iPhone “is almost contagious,” says Todd Sutton, project controls manager at Zachry Construction Corp. “One person gets it on the jobsite, and then everyone has them.”
A new MoGo Talk XD case (top), which comes with a built-in headset keeper, makes them even sweeter. Infectious adoption also applies to the iPad, Sutton says. Employees see how much work colleagues get done with them and buy their own. Developers at Motion Computing, whose tablet options include bar-code and RFID readers, say the Apple device popularity is good for tablet computing, because it introduces more people to the form, and many will go on to more powerful machines. In the wings is Golden-i, a heads-up-display and voice-activated, remote-access computer controller from Kopin Corp., is expected to hit the market soon.
source: enr.com
A Power Engineering guided technical tour of Areva Solar's linear Fresnel solar power plant in California.
World Trade Center Construction Update, October 2010
New York, October 22, 2010
Published: Nov 8, 2010
Entergy Corp. shut its 1,020 MW Indian Point 2 nuclear reactor in New York after a transformer explosion, according to a report from the U.S. Nuclear Regulatory Commission. The blast did not cause any injuries or release of radiation.
It was unclear whether the entire transformer would have to be replaced. The plant is currently in “cold” shutdown, meaning it will take longer for the unit to send power to the grid.
Another transformer failed at the plant in 2007, according to the NRC.
Indian Point 3 was not affected and is operating at full capacity.
Power-Gen Worldwide
A Power Engineering technical tour of the modernization project at Duke Energy's 760 MW Cliffside Power Plant.
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Rafting & Funyaking in Deerfield, Massachusetts
Funyaking Is Really Fun from Aligzandr on Vimeo.
We really had a blast!!! 8-mile rafting & funyaking in Massachusetts. May 30, 2010. Video taken with FlipHD camcorder. Produced with CyberLink PowerDirector.
Breathe from Aligzandr on Vimeo.
Enjoying the water with a waterproofed Flip camcorder. Hotel pool, Windsor Locks, Connecticut.
Behind The Scenes from Aligzandr on Vimeo.
White Water Rafting and Funyaking at Deerfield River, Massachusetts. May 30, 2010.
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