Brian Kerr

Because AATA press releases get posted online in evil insect PDF format:

AATA to convert to hybrid electric bus technology

ANN ARBOR, MI — Fifteen hybrid electric buses will be introduced into the Ann Arbor Transportation Authority (AATA) fleet this fall as the next step in its continuing effort to minimize negative impacts on the environment and cut operating costs.

Funding for the fifteen new buses comes from a combination of federal and state grants obtained by AATA. AATA plans to eventually replace its entire fleet with clean-air hybrid electric technology. According to AATA Manager of Maintenance Terry Black, AATA plans to receive the new buses in September and October.

“Hybrid electric buses feature a combination of a battery-powered electric motor to provide most of the power at slower speeds and a smaller, clean-diesel engine that takes over at higher speeds,” Black said. “AATA expects to use 67,600 gallons less diesel fuel, saving more than $2.5 million in fuel costs, over the 12-year life expectancy of the vehicles.”

… AATA plans to eventually convert its entire fleet to hybrid electric buses as its current buses reach the end of their life expectancy, Black said.

Today’s press release isn’t online yet, but essentially reiterates this one from last fall (WARNING PDF follows WARNING).

(tags: annarbor psyops public-transportation ypsilanti)

Text of an announcement I tried and failed to send to the a2b3-coworking mailing list:

Introducing ‘a2b3-microworking’ a public calendar over on Google Calendar.

HTML: http://tinyurl.com/37neb2
ICAL: http://tinyurl.com/3a4m8d
RSS:  http://tinyurl.com/377xnk

Syndicated at http://a2pla.net/a2b3/ and etc.

What is microcoworking? http://wordie.org/words/microcoworking

Why not Yahoo calendar? because it’s more stingy with feeds and I bet more of us use Google Calendar anyways. The only grossness is that one of the people who are using it already will have to ’share’ calendar posting access with you.

I’ll conclude with the description I wrote for the google calendar:

“Microcoworking calendar for folks in and around Ann Arbor. If you have work to do, but not a place to work, you are invited to join us whenever and wherever there is something on the calendar. You may also add time to the calendar, just make sure to be there. Send a note to brian@joechip.net to get magic calendar posting privileges (sorry for the hassle).”

If any of you putative microcoworkers have ideas for how I can make this work better for you, let me know.

(tags: annarbor coffee collective invitations microcoworking public-transportation)

Graduate student Brian

Working on a4a, which is a bunch of things all at once. It’s an art gizmo, a rehabilitation tool, and an inviting space. Conceptually we’re still in the tag cloud stage, but will serialize that down to an elevator pitch soon enough.

Reading old science fiction, it’s good fodder for wordie.

Other stuff too boring to write about.

Human being Brian

Ostensibly heading out to RecentChangesCamp 2007 next week for a few quality days of sitting in a big empty room with a bunch of people talking about open culture + open technology, for some values of “open,” “culture,” and “technology.”

Winter in Animal Crossing, snow on the ground every day, and falling sometimes. There are snowballs; you can roll a couple snowballs up and make a snowman. (Once in a while you can see a tiny dung beetle (!) industriously pushing around a snowball.) If you do a good job and roll a correctly-proportioned snowman, it’ll say thanks, and then mail you a gift. If you roll a grossly disproportionate snowman — whose head is too big for its body — it’ll tell you that it’s happy to be alive, or that it’s enjoying its birthday, and that it’s glad you made it, even if it wishes you had paid more attention. Regardless, your snowman will melt over the next few days, and disappear. There’s a melancholy here, but that’s how Animal Crossing works. It’s kind of how life works too.

Working on a project which I need to figure out how to decloak. It’s something kind of embarrassing, but also the kind of thing that everybody should try at least once.

Enjoying Slicehost: slowly consolidating web sites, defunct project repositories, etc. into the same place. LightTPD with mod_evhost is pretty cool. Maybe the closest we’ll get to Xanadude Ted Nelson’s infotopia is, I dunno, running a jabber server and asking it how early we are for the bus. The nice thing about riding the bus is that you’re always early for the next bus.

Getting ready for a sea change, not sure what I’m looking for but I’ll know it when I see it.

(tags: animalcrossing public-transportation self slicehost umsi)

DowntownYpsi.org is a new group blog about, well, downtown Ypsilanti. Thus far shopping is the primary topic, but it’s moving towards a more general focus. It’s interesting reading, with the likely prospect of us living in Ypsi for six plus months next year.

Carfree Ann Arbor has been around since August, but I don’t think I’ve talked it up enough. Tools and hints for navigating Ann Arbor in ways other than an automobile. Lots of bike and public transit content.

(tags: annarbor public-transportation weblogs)

Event tomorrow:

Interested in bringing quality rapid transit to southeast Michigan? Want to help push for commuter trains from Ann Arbor and Ypsi to Detroit, metro Airport, Chelsea, and Livingston County? Curious about the latest findings from the Southeastern Michigan Council of Governments (SEMCOG) on transit in our area? Come to a meet-up with Transportation Riders United (TRU), a non-profit group working to improve public transit in southeast Michigan.

I have a standing class meeting during this time (Dan Klyn’s information architecture preachment), so I’ll hope for a write-up in an arborblog or on arborwiki.

(tags: annarbor public-transportation urbanranger)