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Aloha green

Westsideaction

This is a streetlight in a parking lot. It has a wind turbine on the bottom, and a solar panel on the top. The lights appear to be LEDs. It struck me as sort of overkill to have two energy sources (unless the solar electricity was used to turn the turbine to fan the parking lot…). Especially, since the light fixtures were in a parking lot of a state park that closed every day at 6 (darkness comes at 7). What exactly was being illuminated? It struck me as a federal funding project in search of an application. Continue reading Aloha green

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Aloha rack and roll

Westsideaction

Every Hawaiian bus had a rack and roll bike rack on the front of it. Oahu, the island Honalulu and Waikiki are on, is all one big city, and city buses go all around the island including one circumnavigation route that takes four hours. As shown, the bike racks carry THREE bikes at a time. Inside the bus, there is an automated announcement system (audible and visual) that announces every stop, complete with landmarks. Consider an Ottawa bus annoucing “Kent Street… Minto Place, Minto Hotel, Constitution Square, Crowne Plaza Hotel, connection to route 12…”. These annoucements were really detailed on … Continue reading Aloha rack and roll

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Aloha transport

Westsideaction

 If you examine the above snap closer, you’ll see the cyclist has a surfboard on the rack attached to the side of his bike. On a parked bike, the rack looked like this: However, most cyclists didn’t bother with a surfboard rack, they just cycled along with it under their arm. Yes, the surfboard was longer than their bike; and yes, Hawaii is a windy place. It was also common to see kids about 12 years old with boogie boards on the bus going from school to the beach for a quick bit of surfing after math. Kids also get … Continue reading Aloha transport

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Aloha Signage

Westsideaction

Hawaii had a real laid back attitude to signs. Consider the two official signs shown above. Nice graphic of falling rocks, with a human figure. The Humpback whale sign requires some closer scrutiny: notice how it illustrates the consequence of hitting a whale — you may be thrown out of your boat! And yes, the whale and boat are to scale, and yes, with 10,000 whales in a fairly confined bay area they are abundant. Food related signs are usually fun. I like the concept of pizza delivery the Hawaiian way. Do not feed the hippies sign was on a … Continue reading Aloha Signage