It Ain't Rockefeller Center > Wanna Call It "A Winter Wonderland"?? or Rinky Dink?

Got an email | Subject: RE: Holiday Plans . . . sending it along, but don't know about the words it's BACK & BIGGER THAN EVER EVENT! But . . .                                       

[. . . maybe the Festival of Lights across from Pioneer Park that usually attracts 500,000 to 1,000,000 but nobody knows for sure how many?]
Now that Valley Metro Light Rail is gliding down the middle of Main Street the whole New Urban DTMesa is making a wish

Winter Wonderland Ice Rink?
Winter Wonderland Ice Rink is located on the east side of Mesa City Plaza at 20 E. Main Street
Open Nov. 27 – Jan. 3
Monday – Friday 5 – 10 p.m.
Saturday – Sunday 10 a.m. – 10 p.m.
Rink holds 125 people at one time.
Price: $10 for one hour (includes skate rental)
No discount for personal skates
Keep an eye-out for affiliated tie-in when you shop on Main Street: Another benefit to shopping downtown this season – any purchase at a participating business grants customers a $2 off coupon for the new ice skating rink at City Plaza!

The rented rink is getting some strands of overhead lights and the sides getting hung with green garlands.
In the image to the left you can get a fix on the human scale of things installed on the parking lot next to City Hall.
If you sit in the upper levels of the bleachers you might be able to watch the skating or stand long the sides like these people inspecting the rink installation on Thursday
Imagine if you can 125 people all at the same time - of all skating skills - going round-and-round synchronized at the same speed skating along inside the rink . . . ya better watch out and ya better not pout if ya fall down or have wobbly ankles or lose your balance.

At full capacity [125 people per hour] each weekday will have 625 people, or $6,250 income.
For weekends, at full capacity, 2500 people for both days, or $25,000 income

Ooops! Modern Times @ The World-Famous Nile Theater



 “It’s a blast dude. I’ve met so many cool people. This is a great venue, it’s downtown Mesa. What else could you ask for?” 

- Those words are from a November 13 article by Ryan Scott that appeared in Modern Times Magazine about the Whisker Bent & HellBound 3 Competition November 7th.

 

Good News + Bad News > Call The House! Toll-Free

Whether you ride or not, public transportation benefits all of us. It reduces pollution, eases traffic congestion, and helps our communities thrive. In cities, suburbs, and rural America, public transit provides vital connections to jobs, education, medical care, and our larger communities. Help us keep America moving. - See more at: http://voicesforpublictransit.org/#sthash.TQ7ghjY2.dpuf

The good news is, both the Senate and the House have passed multi-year, comprehensive transportation bills.

The bad news is, the House legislation doesn’t significantly increase funding for public transit beyond current levels.

Please call the Voices for Public Transit Legislative Hotline now at (888) 443-5862 to urge Senators McCain and Flake and Representative Sinema to increase America’s investment in public transportation.

The call is free and will only require a few minutes of your time.

We have one last opportunity to make sure the final legislation Congress sends to President Obama funds public transit at the highest levels possible. We have to make it clear to Congress that America wants increased long-term funding for public transit.

Here’s all you have to do:

• Call (888) 443-5862 and listen to our brief instructions
• You’ll be connected to your U.S. Representative’s office first
• Stay on the line and you’ll be connected to your Senators’ offices as well.

Congress will likely be voting on the final legislation in the next week or so. Calls from voters now will ensure they pass a long-term transportation bill that enables our nation to expand and improve public transit.

Let’s make the phones ring off the hook on Capitol Hill.

Call the Voices for Public Transit Legislative Hotline at (888) 443-5862 today!

Transit-Oriented Development TOD > New Urban DT Mesa

The largely Susan Tibschraeny-owned stretch of Main Street on the north side west of Robson near the Country Club/MainStreet Valley Metro Light Rail Station and adjacent to Courtyard Towers [that recently sold for $21 million dollars] will be the chosen site for a new food enterprise revamping what used to be Urban Picnic @ 216 that closed in June of this year [see post on this blog June 13].
After just signing a lease, the new business owners with management background at Postino's, were found on-site inside the location yesterday making preliminary plans to re-configure and re-equip the space to bring it up to code for the anticipated opening.
We talked for a brief time about the menu offerings and DT Mesa. Readers will eagerly wait to see how things develop here - more details will be forthcoming as progress moves ahead on this transit-oriented development that downtown residents, office/retail and city employees, plus other business owners look forward to on Main Street.

Just  a couple of doors away @ 202 W Main The Old Brick House usually open occasionally in the back garage of the Drew Building had this notice posted on the door:

 

What Will Buildings In The Future Look Like?

Image sent by Matt Green Green Consulting LLC

High Tech with all the high-tech gizmos or  a living-green vertical forest?
Two different perspectives with two different timeframes:
One a hundred years from now
One now by Stefano Boeri in Lausanne, SwitzerWonderland
THE FUTURE IS NOW
[it's looking green, renewable, regenerative, energy-efficient + increasing the health, productivity and well-being of residents]
BTW: thanks to two contacts, the first and closest Matt Green who purchased a home here in Mesa in 2010 located in one of downtown's historic districts, studied architecture @ ASU and has worked on different projects in Harlem, the Navajo Reservation in Arizona, and sites in New Mexico. The other is BrianG.Donnelly, an "architectneur' based in Toronto.

The headline image is featured in TreeHugger | Making Sustainability Sexy [go figure] . . . and while you're on the site there's  very good report day 16 November titled
Daniel Wallach of Greensburg explains how to talk to a conservative about the environment.

In another report from the U.S.Department of Energy [ link here >> http://energy.gov/eere/buildings/buildings-future ] efforts are aimed to investigate key design and technology trends and current unknown areas that could revolutionize the built environment across the areas of energy and water use, greenhouse gas emissions, material consumption, building control and communication, resilient design, occupant health and productivity, and cyber and physical security . . . Group members also considered related topics that may directly impact the long-term trajectory of buildings, such as modes of transportation, electric grid integration, and community-scale planning,  . . Through surveys conducted by the Buildings of the Future participants, a next-generation building’s top attribute will be its ability to increase the health, productivity, and wellbeing of occupants.

http://www.achrnews.com/articles/131005-what-will-buildings-look-like-in-100-years#

Here are some other images to feast your eyes, get inspired and get seriously curious about >

THE BIG WE > Here. There + Everywhere | Music Makes The Mark On/Off Main Street

Mesa Channel 11 on-site

As soon as local City-owned local Mesa Channel 11uploads their coverage of the 1st Mesa Music Fest it will get posted here -  crews, staff and equipment were all over the  streets day and night Friday, Saturday and Sunday . . . your MesaZona blogger [slightly overtaken by the earth-shaking + loud-pounding music did manage to snap a timelapse blurry image to the left].
Social media - in the hands of the public - was all over  with many people connecting with free @mesa WiFi .
Having been "around the block" more than a few times in major cities like Washington DC, Philadelphia, Boston and New York City, gotta say it was a big surprise to see so many people working together to promote the New Urban Downtown Mesa - it worked!



The often-ignored MacDonald Street, south of Main, was center stage

Prime Cut & Sew caught attention

 Inside peek at Salt Mine Recording Studios



Boeing Apache A64E Attack Helicopter @ Dubai Airshow 2015

Going  global and worldwide