It is implied...especially in this sentence:

"Often the world's tallest buildings are simply the edifice of a broader skyscraper building boom, reflecting a widespread misallocation of capital and an impending economic correction," it said.

Basically the article is implying that building skyscrapers causes an "impending economic correction" because of "a widespread misallocation of capital."

This is more of a development but it doesn't fit into Phoenix, Tucson or Las Vegas.

http://www.bizjournals.com/phoenix/n...lar-tower.html

Here's a book that I got for a Christmas gift and forgot to post here. I know a bunch of you guys would probably be interested in it. Nicely done, covers almost the entire state.

It's the official book of the Arizona Centennial
Arizona 100 Years Grand
Lisa Schnebly Heidinger
Contributors including Sen. John McCain

So, how out-of-line/ignorant/moronic/inappropriate/ill-informed was this post?

http://forum.skyscraperpage.com/show...&postcount=430

I'm only curious because I know how much I've pissed off the Arizonans on this board on a near-weekly basis, either intentionally or unintentionally.

It's dead on.

^ I agree. Arizona was a politically more peaceful state when I moved here in 1993, a more of a live and let live mentality. Due to 9/11 and now the Great Recession, the white people that dominate the state's politics and the white people that re-elect them became dark and angry, and took out their frustrations on the weakest segments of society. Never have I seen such demagoguery and outright lies promulgated to win elections, and I suspect, to some degree, this is going on nationwide.

--don

Thanks guys.

I read a fantastic book for a class last year titled Sunbelt Justice (the author's name escapes me at the moment). Its a look at the formation and evolution of Arizona's Department of Corrections since its inception in 1958. I tend to think of it as a microcosm of what Arizona's become as a whole, since back in the 1960s and 70s, the AZ DOC was considered one of the more progressive systems in the country (its directors where usually brought in from somewhere else, which was a sore point for native Arizonans in the criminal justice system).

That all changed by the time Sam Lewis became director and pandered to the pissed off elderlies in the retirement communities back in the 1980s. Not that I believe prisoners should be "coddled" but look at how ineffective "tough on crime" and "zero tolerance" measures have been over the past three decades in reducing prison populations and recidivism...last I heard, Arizona has one of the highest per capita incarceration rates in the country.

Like I said, I tend to view what happened to the Department of Corrections as a smaller version of what happened to Arizona as a whole over the last 30 years.

Wow Rep. John Kavanagh is on fire. Won't pass Downtown Campus SRC project but is a co-sponsor for HB 2675.


Arizona lawmakers have proposed a bill that would require some in-state students at ASU, NAU and UA to pay a portion of their tuition without the assistance of scholarships or grants.
House Bill 2675, proposed by Rep. John Kavanagh, R-Fountain Hills, would require all public Arizona university full-time students to contribute at least $2,000 of their annual tuition, without the assistance of money funded by a university or university affiliate.
The bill has not yet been assigned to a committee, where lawmakers would debate the bill and decide whether to approve it for full floor discussion.
Part-time, in-state students would pay an amount proportional to their credit hours.
Students who are registered for at least 12 credit hours during a semester are considered full time, with students carrying less than that considered part time.
According to HB 2675, a student may not use any “source of public or private funding, including grants, gifts, scholarships or tuition benefits, or other types of funding administered by or through a university or an affiliate of a university.”
Up to 5 percent of first-time undergraduates who pay for school using a competitive, national merit-based or athletic scholarship wouldn’t have to pay the $2,000. The bill exempts scholarships based “solely on academic merit or solely on a special aptitude, talent or ability from a competitive national program.”
Rep. Nancy McLain, R-Bullhead City, co-sponsored HB 2675 and said she chose to support the bill because a large number of students don’t pay for tuition.
“A student should have (an) investment in their own education,” she said. “If you have an interest then maybe you wouldn’t drop out or take frivolous classes.”
Although McLain said she would support the bill if it made its way to a vote, she questioned the exceptions for students on athletic and national merit-based scholarships.
“That doesn’t seem right to me,” McClain said noting that this section of the bill may be reworked.
Arizona Board of Regents spokeswoman Katie Paquet said while the Board is still reviewing the full impact of the bill, they have voted to oppose it.
“Our initial response is that it would have a negative impact on students’ educations,” Paquet said.
Rep. Bob Robson, R-Chandler, another co-sponsor of the bill, said he believes the $2,000 tuition contribution to be a little excessive, but is still a firm supporter.
“There (are) a whole host of ways to pay for education,” he said. “There are ways to work out paying for tuition.”
Aeronautical engineering junior Victor Dominguez said he receives a need-based scholarship available to engineering transfer students from community colleges. This scholarship pays for his entire tuition.
He said having to raise the required annual $2,000 contribution could be a problem for him.
“If I couldn’t afford it, I probably wouldn’t be able to go to school,” Dominguez said. “That’s $2,000 I might not have.”

http://www.azcentral.com/ic/news/air...lede-image.jpg
Mark Henle/The Republic

Surrounded
by pollution
Pollution persists after decades of regulation; growth and land use compound the challenges
Story by Shaun McKinnon
http://www.azcentral.com/news/air-qu...ent=1-overview

Totally love that photo. This should be a very good, hopefully interesting series. I'm very impressed by the stuff, like this, that is done by the Arizona Republic.

I may quibble with phsSUNSfan over particulars but when it comes to the KISS approach to sprawl, nobody does it better. It's sad.... It's frustrating.... Until the body politic of this area changes
it will continue to be a struggle to prevent sprawl and encourage urbanism and transit. Baby steps I guess.

I noticed that Arizona showed the President its best collection of cranes.

Just caught this... not a problem. Coffee Talk, I had no knowledge of such things.

Actually, I anticipated that my time would tighten up end of January. It indeed appears that my "randoming" time has been eviscerated, evaporated by the desert air.

Here's hoping a few of those cranes make their way to the urban core. It can be dramatic the change to an urban landscape, even with reclaimed brownfields. ... http://denverinfill.com/blog/wp-cont...tan.1.28.8.jpg

Arizona state legislators are EVIL.

I wouldn't say evil, more like retarded.

Too poor to afford college? too bad, now clean my toilets peasant!

Glad that air pollution article touched on the fact that all the empty lots contribute to our poor air. There's really so many simple things the City could do tomorrow to promote infill and temporary uses on all those dirt lots, its frustrating it hasn't happened years ago. PhxDowntowners great Valley of the Sunflowers project showed the way, we need dozens more projects like that.

Land bankers absolutely shouldn't be allowed to just sit on dirt lots that blow dust and create a blighted neighborhood. Either plant sunflowers, or date palms/citrus (then harvest the fruit), grass, a temporary community garden, etc. or face a dramatic increase in your property taxes. That tax could be specifically directed towards other things to help with air pollution, i.e. funding for transit.

Unfortunately Kavanagh will probably get re-elected. He's from Fountain Hills. The town that fought against having the city do trash pick-up (to save money on road maintenance and free the roads from numerous stinky trucks) because they thought it was a big government takeover of their rights as citizens. Fucking tea party pieces of shit.

'Tea partyers' oppose changes to Fountain Hills trash collection

By saying he's retarded you're giving him a free pass. A retard doesn't understand the nature and consequences of his decisions. Kavanagh, on the other hand, fully understands his decisions and is consciously trying to hurt young and educated people, and hinder the growth of Phoenix. He is evil, not retarded.

^ Never will happen in a laissez faire state like Arizona. What you propose would be derided as:

1. a tax increase...
2. big government run amok...
3. a restraint on the freedoms of landowners everywhere to be left alone.

--don

I have some photos of the city taken from South Mountain in late December 2011 that, no matter how much I try to clear some of it up through Photoshop, continue to show ridiculous amounts of air pollution.

Its unfortunate and disgusting :(

The Republic used to do this series as far back as the 1990's. It was "The Brown Cloud" series. They also used to cover the explosive growth with a series called "An Acre an Hour". I used to love to read these articles too.

So I know I already posted my thoughts here on Hance Park, but since I had written it all up already, I just lazily used it as my Blooming Rock post for the month, which you can see here:

http://bloomingrock.com/2012/01/30/r...rst-urban-park

I added a few slides, corrected some grammar and clarified some things. Check it out if you're bored :)