Credit, endless credit
Posted onMarch 2, 2010
Filed under For the love of interactivity, Good journalism, Online | 2 Comments
The New York Times has a nearly flawless multimedia feature entitled The Debt Trap about credit-laden consumers around the world. Its multimedia features attempt to bring home the story to Americans that they are not alone in their credit crisis, but it’s happening to people just like them who live as far away as Brazil, South Korea and Turkey.
Going through the Debt Trap multimedia portal, the reader is confronted with three images fading in and out to illustrate the themes the editors are trying to get across: consumers who are losing everything because they’re drowning in debt, credit firms that are pushing cards on unwary buyers and the global expansion of credit card use.
At every point you can “return to series” and you are presented with something like the main menu, which has the initial three images. You can either click ‘Start’ to begin the guided journey, or you can click on the “go to series page” and it shows you a more typical online format with articles listed down the page (they range from July 20 2008 – Jan 1 2009) and four multimedia videos, each called the Debt Trap.
There is an interactive feature of “What the world owes” with a map of the world showing credit card debt as a percentage of disposable income and the number of cards per person and the percentage change of the number of people using cards (Asia being the highest in this last category.)
Images, such as those in “The global lure of plastic,” brings the story home to Americans. A video and article on credit firms targeting college students makes the story painfully clear. The article quotes one young student saying, “‘They did a good job,’ Mr. Muneio, 21 and a junior at Michigan State, said of the tactic. ‘It was good advertising.’”
Windsor, oh Windsor, wherefore art thou Windsor Station?
Posted onMarch 1, 2010
Filed under New story, Pet project: Windsor station | 1 Comment
Story sources: Windsor station “renaissance” as a transportation hub
Primary Sources:
1. Submission of a Resolution to the City Council. Canada NewsWire. 14 December 2009. “The Administration Supports the Canadian Urban Transit Association’s Vision and Reasserts its Commitment to Public Transit and Active Transportation”
[Quote: Following on CUTA's 2009 Conference in Montréal from November 7 to 11, 2009, entitled "Public Transit: Towards Sustainable Solutions," Manon Barbe, Montréal Executive Committee responsible for Transportation, and Majority Leader Marvin Rotrand are announcing the submission of a resolution to the December 14 city council meeting in support of the Canadian Urban Transit Association's Transit Vision 2040.
"By submitting this resolution to City Council members, we want to ensure that all elected officials confirm their support for the development of public transit and active transportation on behalf of Montréal residents from the very beginning of this new term of office. By endorsing this resolution, which was drafted in conjunction with CUTA, Montréal is placing the development of mass transit at the top of its concerns and is seeking increased funding to better ensure the creation of public transit services and infrastructure," said Marvin Rotrand.]
2. Blog post on Spacing Montreal: “Windsor Station: A brief history of development” by Emile Thomas
3.Blog post on Spacing Montreal: “New AMT Windsor station hub examined” by Jacob Larsen.
4. Blog post on Cooliopolis.com: “Save Windsor Station! Demolish the Bell Centre!” by Kristian
Secondary Sources:
1. GAZETTE EXCLUSIVE: Next stop, Windsor Station; Trains, buses, tramways; Proposed as transportation hub in major redevelopment of area, by Andy Riga. The Montreal Gazette, 12 November 2009.
[Quote: Transportation Reporter Historic Windsor Station may be reborn as a major transportation hub, welcoming trains, buses and tramways, The Gazette has learned. The Agence métropolitaine de transport has presented its $520-million proposal to senior Quebec ministers in recent months and hopes to get the green light for the project by next summer, said AMT chief executive Joël Gauthier. "We're talking about a brand-new intermodal station," Gauthier said.
"It's the renaissance of Windsor Station. We think this is a tremendously strategic site."]
2. Gazette reaction article: “Rail plan full of ‘hot air’; Transit hub; Buy, tear down Bell Centre, let Windsor station be, activist says” by Andy Riga. The Montreal Gazette. 17 November 2009.
[Quote: Michael Fish, the architect and heritage activist who created Friends of Windsor Station in 1970 and saved it from CP's wrecking ball, says Montrealers should be wary of a proposed $520-million transportation hub that would incorporate Windsor Station.
Fish says it would probably be cheaper to buy and tear down the Bell Centre, which sits between train tracks and Windsor Station, and then put the rails back where they were before the Canadiens' home was built in 1996.And he suggests the plan to circumvent the Bell Centre by connecting Canadian Pacific tracks to a new building south of Windsor Station using 18-metre-high tracks would make St. Antoine ugly, dark and dreary by creating a long tunnel.]
3. Gazette opinion article: Should the Bell Centre go? by Henry Aubin. The Montreal Gazette. 26 November 2009.
[Quote: The Idea sounds a little daffy but it's hard to tell because there have been no studies by the AMT or anyone else. A provincial agency's proposal to build a station for both rail and bus passengers is stirring controversy.
This "inter-modal" station, which would be part of a large real-estate development also featuring a hotel, condos and offices, would be built across from Windsor Station on the other side of St. Antoine St. What's controversial is the rail line's new route. At present, the CP lines from Rigaud, Blainville and Delson end at the Bell Centre. Under the Agence métropolitaine de transport's proposal, the trains would keep going, bypassing the Bell Centre by swinging across St. Antoine St. on elevated tracks, and coming to a halt in the new complex.]
Interview Subjects:
As I yet, I do not have any interview subjects.
