Past Programs
Transport - 2008
Trends Electric Cars
03/12/2008
Trends and Products is the part of the show where each week we take a look at what's happening in a particular part of the designed world.
With the dire situation facing the automobile industry and people's continuing concern about the cost of petrol and traffic congestion, it's timely this week that we're looking at the developments in the design of energy-efficient electric cars.
2nd Avenue subway New York
26/11/2008
The 2nd Avenue subway is the first subway to be built in New York in nearly 100 years. Segments of line have been built over the years, but a new line - as this is - has taken a lot of work, a lot of lobbying, and a lot of money. Janne Ryan talks on site to the chief engineer on the project, David Caidon.
London under Boris
17/05/2008
On May 3, when Boris Johnson arrived at City Hall to sign the official acceptance of the office of Mayor of London, he stood up to make a speech, tripped on a step and nearly fell over. He then got in a muddle about which architectural peer, Rogers or Foster, had designed the building in which he and his audience were standing.
In fact, it was Norman Foster, though in many respects Richard Rogers was the architect of choice for Ken Livingstone, the man whom Boris had defeated and who had held the office for eight years.
So does Boris Jonson's apparent inability to tell one significant British architect from another bode ill for the architectural future of one of the world's greatest cities? Why has the hard-left Ken been in bed with feral developers? And is the congestion charge really such a good idea? To try to answer these and other questions we talk to the distinguished writer on design, Stephen Bayley.
The aesthetics of mobility
12/04/2008
Increasingly today we spend more time between places, travelling -- by public transport or car -- from home to the office, taking the kids to sport, or visiting friends.
In the course of a day, some of us spend hours mobile, transiting through a gigantic network of public space.
The visual quality of this experience -- what we see from the window of the train or the car -- is of great concern to Francine Houben, one of Europe's most active architects.
Human scale urban design
05/01/2008
When is the last time you came into the centre of your city, just to hang out? Well if you're in Melbourne, Adelaide or Perth, it might have been quite recently, because one of the world's most eminent urban planners, Jan Gehl, has monitored how people use those cities and has suggested how to make them more walkable and liveable. And now it's Sydney's turn.
This interview was originally broadcast 25 August 2007.
