Revisiting something that I wrote about years ago. Public transit stations are places of movement. Travelers not only move between stations, but within stations as well. The many escalators and stairways (and the spaces around them) in London’s Westminster Station are just as mechanical as the trains that whisk commuters from place to place. In many ways, subway stations [...]

Located on the Asian side of Istanbul, Turkey the airport has seen increased expansion due to increased domestic and international traffic at Ataturk International Airport (on the European side). Like my other pictures of airports, neon signs are present at Sabhia Gokcen. They announce to the weary traveler that either hot coffee or cold beer [...]

Globalization is a funny thing. It takes on many forms, shapes and symbols. Something, which I have become increasingly interested in is the “Mediterraneanization” of global culture. However, by “Mediterranean,” I mean the Americanized or California interpretation of the climate and culture the Old World Mediterranean. I couldn’t help but be amused by this cafe [...]

The Frankfurt Airport is busiest airport by passenger traffic in Germany, and the third busiest in Europe. It is also the ninth busiest worldwide in 2008. In the works before 1930, it opened in 1936 as the Rhein-Main Airport and Airship Base (the second-largest airport in Germany). Since the 1970s, it has become a major [...]

The J. Paul Getty museum overlooks West Los Angeles like a citadel – a fortress city – upon a hill. Designed by Richard Meier, it is accessible to the public via a tram that winds its way up Santa Monica Mountains. Its location and its emphasis on classical "western" art has opened it up to [...]

In the 19th century, a great number of Chinese immigrants arrived in California to build railroads and work on farms. Throughout California, Chinatowns were set up and the San Joaquin Valley and Fresno was no exception. A community was set up in Hanford as one of many “China Alley”s throughout the United States. As an urban [...]

The Tijuana-San Ysidro border crossing is the world’s busiest land border crossing. Over 17 million vehicles and 50 million people entered the United States at the San Ysidro port of entry a year. Many of the border crossing involve workers commuting and people visiting family members.The traffic at the border crossing reflects the symbiotic relationship [...]

This was taken near the Los Angeles Central Library. This plaque indicates that the sidewalk across the street from the library (along 5th) is actually privately owned. This privatization of public space, to create what some have called post-public space, has profound implications on the physical navigation and use of cities. Los Angeles is not [...]

I like how the private space of the skyscrapers looms over the public space of the library in this picture. Bunker Hill’s “Fortification” as Mike Davis has called it, is stark when looking at the organization of space around the Central Library. Much of the area around the library, including the sidewalks, are technically private [...]

For the past 100 years, Spanish-Colonial Revival has been central to a local mythology that romanticizes the style in architecture and popular culture. Sites such as Union Station in the heart of Los Angeles are excellent examples of the region’s integration of the mythic past into urban development. Yet, we should not ignore that its [...]