For example:
Click the image to see at full resolution.
This type of mapping metadata has been available in Google Earth for a long time, I’m actually surprised these features weren’t available sooner.
Archive for May, 2008
Google Maps adds Photos and Wikipedia to their online maps
Sunday, May 18th, 2008Pictures along the Mississippi River in Minneapolis
Sunday, May 18th, 2008Here are some pictures I took this past Saturday along the Mississippi River in Minneapolis. I’ll have to put together some commentary to go along with them soon. Until then you can peruse the pictures…
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| The Modest Mississipp |
Frustrated NWA flight attendant starts fire mid-flight + other bizarre news
Friday, May 16th, 2008Unbelievable!
A 19 year old twin cities resident and NWA flight attendant lit some paper towels on fire to set of the plane’s smoke alarm and bring the flight to an early end because he was frustrated with the MSP to Regina, Saskatchewan, Canada route.
The charge of setting fire aboard a civil aircraft carries a maximum penalty of 20 years in prison.
Pilot Steve Peterka told authorities that an indicator light came on about 35 minutes into the flight, showing smoke in the rear bathroom.
Peterka called Rojas, who was assigned passengers in the back of the plane, and asked him to check the bathroom, documents said. Rojas, another flight attendant and a passenger were credited with quickly putting out the flames with fire extinguishers, authorities said.
Investigators later found a lighter in one of the overhead bins. Rojas confessed after authorities interviewed him, the complaint said.
In other unbelievably bizarre news – another local 19 year old survived jumping head-first into a wood chipper.
And some less odd news – a MN Judge tries to close a loophole in a recent smoking ban. Since smoking is allowed only as part of a theatrical performance, bars held “theater nights” where patrons paid a small fee to become an “actor” in the evening performance (i.e. smoking).
Following the ruling, Bullseye owner Robert Ripley said he is asking his bartenders to prevent smoking indoors and remove all ashtrays.
But he also seized on a footnote in the ruling speculating that some performances may fit within the statewide ban and that they may be considered on a case-by-case basis.
“I think we’re going to start writing our own scripts,” Ripley said.
February, customers in bars from the Iron Range to the metro area — with the bars’ encouragement — started dressing in Renaissance costumes or calling themselves Garth Brooks and lighting up.
Many bars said it was an often-successful attempt to win back patrons after seeing steep declines in revenue after the ban took effect last year. Notices about the smoking performances were posted on doors outside the establishments, and customers would typically buy a pin for $1 or $2 designating them as part of the show.
But Abrams didn’t buy arguments made in court last week that the performances are a form of protected free speech that fit within the law’s exception.
“The criterion for selection of the cast appears to be people with $2 and a desire to smoke in the bar. There is not the slightest suggestion that talent or an interest in conveying a message, other than smoking, is sought from any actor,” he wrote.
Twin Cities get State OK to extend bar closing time for RNC – for a fee!
Twin Cities bars can stay open extra late during the Republican National Convention, thanks to a state measure signed Thursday by Gov. Tim Pawlenty. The provision, part of an omnibus liquor bill, allows bars within the seven-county metro area to stay open until 4 a.m. from the evening of Aug. 31, through the early morning of Sept. 5. The border cities of Northfield and New Prague are included.
Cities can decide whether to allow the later bar closings and what areas or license and zoning classifications would be affected. And they will be able to charge bars a fee of up to $2,500.
Because 2AM just isn’t late enough for national Republican big wigs. Or maybe it’s an attempt to make the city more protester friendly?
And speaking of the GOP RNC this Sept. in St. Ron Paul, city leaders are partnering with Humana to provide 1000 free bicycles during the convention.
To use a Freewheelin cycle, participants would register with credit cards to ensure that they don’t make off with the bikes, which otherwise are expected to be free to use. They then can go online, too, to track how many miles they’ve logged and calories they’ve burned.
Humana also is making 1,000 bicycles available to Denver during the Democratic National Convention, in turn giving Denver and the Twin Cities the opportunity to join Washington at the forefront of communal two-wheel initiatives.
Stories via the Daily Glean.
Minnesota Sesquicentennial Weekend Festival (May 17-18)
Friday, May 16th, 2008The Minnesota Statehood Weekend Festival Commemorates Minnesota’s 150th Anniversary of Statehood Saturday May 17 & Sunday May 18, 2008
Events takes place on or near the State Capitol grounds
Live music, great food and exhibitions of all things Minnesotan!
There won’t be another event like this for 50 years!
Special exhibits at the Minnesota History Center, including the Declaration of Independence and MN150 each day
Also, check out the MN150 wiki page.
Xcel Energy starts building the power grid of the future
Friday, May 16th, 2008SmartGridCity technology will allow Boulder residents to go online to see how much power they are using and what it is costing them. They will be able to control their energy usage with the help of “intelligent” appliances communicating with the power grid. Xcel page on the technology.
Phase I: March 2008 – August 2008
* Includes full-system automation, monitoring and smart meters for the first group of SmartGridCity customers. Involves upgrades to two substations, five feeders and nearly 15,000 meters (representing both residential, commercial and light industrial customers) in Boulder.
* A Web portal will provide consumers with insight into their energy use and information for better home energy management.
* A dedicated customer service phone number (1-877-887-3339) and e-mail address (SmartGridCity@xcelenergy.com) for SmartGridCity customers.
* Some customers can choose to have in-home automation tools, allowing increased control over home energy use and costs.
* By mid-August, initial capabilities should be demonstrated.
Phase II: September 2008 – December 2009
* Complete the installation of a distribution and communication network for remaining areas within Boulder (an additional two substations, 20 feeders and smart meters for an additional 35,000 premises).
* Expanded in-home automation installations.
* Enable Web portal access to all SmartGridCity customers.
* Begin initial integration of plug-in hybrid electric vehicles, solar and wind co-generation sources onto the grid in Boulder.
Truvia, the latest sugar alternative
Friday, May 16th, 2008Cargill, along with Coca-Cola, introduced a new zero-calorie sweetener called Truvia. It’s made from an extract from the leaves of the Stevia plant. Find out about the research behind the rebiana extract.
Pioneer Press: The substance is about 200 times as sweet as sugar, contains no calories and has some advantages to the food industry because it doesn’t degrade when heated or when mixed with other foods. Stevia is commonly used in Japan and parts of South America, but it’s rare in this country outside of health-food circles.
Cargill, based in Wayzata, MN, is the nation’s second largest private company, employs 158,000 employees worldwide and is involved in all sorts of agricultural operations: including grain, cotton, sugar, petroleum and financial trading; food processing; futures brokering; health and pharmaceutical products; agricultural services such as animal feed and crop protection; and industrial products including biofuels, oils and lubricants, starches, and salt.
The Wikipedia profile includes this note about Cargill’s political end economic views:
Cargill is an active proponent of free trade policies. It lobbied for China’s membership in WTO, as well as for increased trade with Cuba and Brazil. Cargill’s position is based on its strong support of neo-liberal economic principles. First, lesser trade barriers in countries where Cargill does business will lower prices on Cargill’s products, and likely increase their volume of business. Second, the decreases in the cost of food in developing countries theoretically result indirectly in higher income per capita but lower income for local farmers. Cargill benefits from increases in consumer income, because better-paid consumers become inclined to eat a diet higher in wheat, protein, vegetable oil, and processed foods. This improves opportunities for Cargill to sell its products. Cargill’s economists have reasoned that this is true of the lower income countries in particular. As a developing country grows from $1,000 to $6,000 in mean income per capita, Cargill expects the greatest profit growth from its businesses in that country.
Cargill has maintained a 100% rating on the Corporate Equality Index (CEI) released by the Human Rights Campaign since 2003.
Other random facts:
- It is responsible for 25 percent of all United States grain exports.
- It supplies approximately 22 percent of the United States domestic meat market.
- The company exports more product from Argentina than any other company.
- It is the largest poultry producer in Thailand.
- All of the eggs used in McDonald’s restaurants in the United States pass through Cargill’s plants.
Gas plans from DC
Thursday, May 15th, 2008Mr. Obama is right to oppose the gas-tax gimmick, but his idea is even worse. Neither proposal addresses the problem of energy supply, especially the lack of domestic oil and gas thanks to decades of Congressional restrictions on U.S. production. Mr. Obama supports most of those “no drilling” rules, but that hasn’t stopped him from denouncing high gas prices on the campaign trail. He is running TV ads in North Carolina that show him walking through a gas station and declaring that he’ll slap a tax on the $40 billion in “excess profits” of Exxon Mobil.
The idea is catching on. Last week Pennsylvania Congressman Paul Kanjorski introduced a windfall profits tax as part of what he called the “Consumer Reasonable Energy Price Protection Act of 2008.” So now we have Congress threatening to help itself to business profits even though Washington already takes 35% right off the top with the corporate income tax.
You may also be wondering how a higher tax on energy will lower gas prices. Normally, when you tax something, you get less of it, but Mr. Obama seems to think he can repeal the laws of economics. We tried this windfall profits scheme in 1980. It backfired. The Congressional Research Service found in a 1990 analysis that the tax reduced domestic oil production by 3% to 6% and increased oil imports from OPEC by 8% to 16%. Mr. Obama nonetheless pledges to lessen our dependence on foreign oil, which he says “costs America $800 million a day.” Someone should tell him that oil imports would soar if his tax plan becomes law. The biggest beneficiaries would be OPEC oil ministers.
Oil company profits aren’t excessive:
Exxon’s profits are soaring with the recent oil price spike, but the energy industry’s earnings aren’t as outsized as the politicians seem to think. Thomson Financial calculates that profits from the oil and natural gas industry over the past year were 8.3% of investment, while the all-industry average is 7.8%. And this was a boom year for oil. An analysis by the Cato Institute’s Jerry Taylor finds that between 1970 and 2003 (which includes peak and valley years for earnings) the oil and gas business was “less profitable than the rest of the U.S. economy.” These are hardly robber barons.
Late this week, a group of Senate Republicans led by Pete Domenici of New Mexico introduced the “American Energy Production Act of 2008″ to expand oil production off the U.S. coasts and in Alaska. It has the potential to increase domestic production enough to keep America running for five years with no foreign imports. With the world price of oil at $116 a barrel, if not now, when? No word yet if Senators Clinton and Obama will take time off from denouncing oil profits to vote for that.
US Senate Democrats unveil new energy tax plan:
…slap a 25 percent windfall profits tax on firms that don’t invest in new energy sources
The Democrats’ energy bill seeks to lay the blame for record-high gasoline prices over $3.60 a gallon on the Bush administration, big oil companies like Exxon and the OPEC oil cartel.
The American Petroleum Institute, which lobbies for big U.S. oil companies, said Democrats’ plans would discourage investment in energy production and lead to less supply.
“None of these proposals will lower the price at the pump,” Senate Republican leader Mitch McConnell said. “All will increase the strain on the family budget.”
The Senate bill seeks to revive a plan already passed by both the Senate and the House of Representatives that would allow the federal government to sue OPEC — source of one-third of global oil supply — for price manipulatio.
Good luck with that…
Meanwhile, Ron Paul is brazen enough to suggest that the government itself is partly to blame for the high gas prices:
federal and state taxes can account for as much as a third of what consumers’ pay at the pump. The Federal Government’s boom-and-bust monetary policy also makes consumers vulnerable to inflation and to constant fluctuations in the prices of essential goods such as oil.
Basic economics says that when government restricts the supply of a good, the price will increase. Yet Congress continues to reject simple measures that could increase the supply of oil. For example, Congress refuses to allow reasonable, environmentally sensitive, offshore drilling. Congress also refuses to remove the numerous regulatory hurdles that add to the prohibitively expensive task of constructing new refineries. Building a new refinery requires billions of dollars in capital investment. It can take several years just to obtain the necessary federal permits. Even after the permits are obtained, construction of a refinery may still be delayed or even halted by frivolous lawsuits. It is no wonder that there has not been a new refinery constructed in the United States since 1976.
Worst planned robbery ever?
Thursday, May 15th, 2008This W. St. Paul Sprint store robbery received recent national attention on Jay Leno. This may be the worst planned robbery ever, you be the judge.
When the wannabe robber was admitted to the hospital for treatment, he was asked what he did for a living. He told the officers, “I rob.”
Watch this news report on the incident.
Kassa reportedly dragged one employee into an office behind the showroom, where he found a second employee. He also found a filing cabinet which he ordered the employees to open, apparently thinking it was a safe.
When Kassa discovered it was full of phone cards, he pistol whipped one of the employees, West St. Paul Police Detective Kevin O’Neill said.
Kassa didn’t realize a third person was in the back of the store, where they called 9-1-1 from.
Kassa reportedly scooped up cash from the store’s tills and had the employees put it in a Sprint bag.
According to police reports, he then produced a roll of duct tape and ordered one employee to tie up the other. Then he ordered the bound employee to tie up the other. After the employees explained how that would be impossible, he tied up the second employee himself.
O’Neill said Kassa then led the two employees out the back door of the store, apparently overlooking the store’s actual safe, which was unlatched at the time. He tried to destroy the store’s security camera system; however, the cameras were linked to a central system outside the store.
Finally, the three exited through the back door, which automatically locked behind them.
When the police arrived, Kassa reportedly fled on foot, ditching the gun but keeping the money. Police said they chased him for about a block until he collapsed, wheezing, from an asthma attack, still clutching the Sprint bag containing the loot. The gun was later recovered by a K-9 unit.
Feel-good legislation: Congress’ symbolic energy bill
Thursday, May 15th, 2008Yesterday congress voted to do something that they openly admitted will make no difference – stop filling the strategic petroleum reserve. How stupid do they think we are? They obviously take their constituents for fools.
Unwilling to adopt a rational national energy policy that would increase domestic supplies of energy and place downward pressure on gasoline prices, Congress is passing its time with unhelpful symbolic gestures. The House and Senate both passed bills Wednesday that would cut off the flow of oil to the nation’s Strategic Petroleum Reserve.
Rep. Joe Barton, previously known for coddling the energy sector and his indifference to air pollution and the need to promote conservation, was nevertheless absolutely on the mark when he called the resolutions “feel-good” legislation. White House spokesman Scott Stanzel is right when he said there is no evidence that ceasing to pump 70,000 barrels of crude oil into the reserve daily would bring down the price of gasoline.
AP:
Rep. John Dingell, D-Mich., acknowledged there was no guarantee that suspending the deliveries would lower gasoline prices, but declared: “Common sense would say not to take oil off the market during a time of record high prices.”
The Strategic Petroleum Reserve was created in the 1970s as a precaution against major interruptions of oil supplies. Today at 701 million barrels it has enough to replace two months of oil imports.
Only Sen. Wayne Allard, R-Colo., voted against the measure.
Bush has steadfastly refused to halt shipments of about 70,000 barrel barrels of oil a day into the Strategic Petroleum Reserve, a system of salt caverns on the Gulf coast. The reserve, created to respond to major oil supply disruptions, holds 701 million barrels and is at 97 percent of capacity.
“There is no evidence that (suspending shipments) will affect the price of oil or gasoline in a meaningful way,” said White House spokesman Scott Stanzel. He said the president opposes any congressional mandate to stop deliveries and believes Congress should focus on broader energy issues.
Stanzel and Bush are right: Suspending shipments into the reserve will have very little, if any, impact on gasoline prices.
Look at the numbers. On average, we pump 70,000 barrels a day into the reserve. Surely leaving that much oil on the market would reduce demand and prices, right?
Wrong. Seventy thousand barrels amounts to 0.35 percent of the 20 million barrels of petroleum we consume daily in this country. That won’t even dent prices.
The only rational argument in favor of suspending strategic reserve shipments is financial. If you believe the current price of oil is artificially high and will fall substantially, then it’s wise to suspend the reserve program and fill it later with cheaper oil.
On the other hand, if you believe the surge in oil prices is real and that prices will be higher five years from now than today, then we should buy that oil now, when it’s cheaper. And that’s the more likely scenario.
There’s also a third way of looking at it. If you’re part of a Congress that has done little to prepare the country for a day we all knew was coming, then voting to suspend the strategic reserve program makes sense because it lets you pretend to be doing something, even though you’re not.
Hypermiling (i.e. hyper-mile-ing) & how to break rush-hour traffic waves
Wednesday, May 14th, 2008Are you ready to join the ranks of the hypermilers? Now that gas prices are so high, it’s a good time to try.
Hypermiling is a modern sport whereby one attempts to get the maximum possible gas mileage.
Check out Hypermiling.com and wikipedia for some good gas sipping suggestions.
Also, can you prevent traffic waves? An electrical engineer in Seattle experiments with “anti-traffic”. (I’ve been doing this in I-65 S evening traffic for years). At least it gives you something challenging to do on the way. Just be prepared to piss a few people off who are right behind you and can’t wait to get to the bumper of the car stopped up ahead. One lesson, leave plenty of gaps for merging traffic.
Suppose we push constantly ahead, change lanes to grab a bit of headway, and always eliminate our forward space in order to prevent other drivers from “cutting us off”. If tiny traffic waves appear, we will rush ahead and then brake hard, leaving larger waves behind us. Repeated action causes the waves to grow huge. Ironic that the angry people who push ahead as fast as possible might unwittingly participate in “amplifying” the very conditions that they hate so much. The solution seems obvious: drivers with a smooth “calm” style will tend to damp out the waves and produce a uniform flow… and the few drivers who intentionally drive at a single constant speed will wipe out the waves entirely.
Minneapolis uses traffic lights on interstate on-ramps to smooth the flow of traffic on the highway and to keep traffic flowing at on-ramps.
