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Details: Written by: Richard_McKie; Parent Category: Travel; Category: North America; Published: 20 December 2010; Hits: 25221

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When we lived in New York my first wife and I had an apartment in a York Avenue high rise, near the East River.

Apartment 27D 1365 York Avenue - new in 1977 under repair in 2010 for concrete cancer

My eldest daughter was born in New York Hospital just across the way. Over the years York Avenue hasn't changed much, except that New York Hospital no longer operates as a general hospital; it has become a medical research institution. But elsewhere New York’s changed a great deal since the late 1970s. The most dramatic changes are downtown, around Soho and on the West Side. An area that used to be mainly artists’ lofts and old garment factories has transmogrified into a major retail area with lots of trendy boutiques. It seems the whole West Side, up into the hundreds, has been gentrified.

Because of my familiarity with the area we rented a serviced apartment in east 58^th street. This is still a good choice as it is an easy walking distance to Fifth Avenue, Central Park, the Museum Of Modern Art, the Metropolitan Museum and the Guggenheim. We were there at the end of March but there was still snow piled at the end of Central Park the day we arrived. Our first night we walked across town, past Carnegie Hall to Broadway and then back via Grand Central station and Lexington.

Broadway - to see more photos click on the above image

You either love New York or you hate it. I’m in the former group. It’s like London, I feel at very much at home when I’m there. But of course it’s quite different to Sydney.

Needless to say we visited the various museums; the Empire State Building; Radio City Music Hall; the Chrysler Building, from outside and above; took a Circle Line tour around the island, taking in the Statue of Liberty; and went to the Opera at the MET one night (la Traviata). We also did the ‘sex in the city thing’, based on the TV show, and shopped. I picked up some new skis and boots from the after winter sales and a new camera. The catalogue of Wendy’s purchases is too long to list here.

Then it was time to pick up the rental car and drive to Washington.

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Travel

Berlin

I'm a bit daunted writing about Berlin.

Somehow I'm happy to put down a couple of paragraphs about many other cities and towns I've visited but there are some that seem too complicated for a quick 'off the cuff' summary. Sydney of course, my present home town, and past home towns like New York and London. I know just too much about them for a glib first impression.

Although I've never lived there I've visited Berlin on several occasions for periods of up to a couple of weeks. I also have family there and have been introduced to their circle of friends.

So I decided that I can't really sum Berlin up, any more that I can sum up London or New York, so instead I should pick some aspects of uniqueness to highlight.

Fiction, Recollections & News

Australia's Hydrogen Economy

As anyone who has followed my website knows, I'm not a fan of using 'Green Hydrogen' (created by the electrolysis of water - using electricity) to generate electricity.

I've nothing against hydrogen. It's the most abundant element in the universe. And I'm very fond of water (hydrogen oxide or more pedantically: dihydrogen monoxide). It's just that there is seldom a sensible justification for wasting most of one's electrical energy by converting it to hydrogen and then back to electricity again.

I've made the argument against the electrolysis (green) route several times since launching this website fifteen years ago; largely to deaf ears.

The exception made in the main article (linked below) is where a generator has a periodic large unusable surpluses in an environment unsuitable for batteries. In the past various solutions have been attempted like heat storage in molten salt. But where there is a plentiful fresh water supply, producing hydrogen for later electricity generation is another option. Also see: How does electricity work? - Approaches to Electricity Storage

Two of these conditions apply in South Australia that frequently has excess electricity (see the proportion of non-hydro renewables chart below). The State Government, with unspecified encouragement from the Prime Minister and the Commonwealth, has offered A$593m to a private consortium to build a 200MW, 100t hydrogen storage at Whyalla. Yet, the State already has some very large batteries, with which this facility is unlikely to be able to compete commercially. Time will tell.

Opinions and Philosophy

The reputation of nuclear power

One night of at the end of March in 1979 we went to a party in Queens. Brenda, my first wife, is an artist and was painting and studying in New York. Our friends included many of the younger artists working in New York at the time. That day it had just been announced that there was a possible meltdown at a nuclear reactor at a place called a Three Mile Island , near Harrisburg Pennsylvania.

I was amazed that some people at the party were excitedly imagining that the scenario in the just released film ‘The China Syndrome’ was about to be realised; and thousands of people would be killed.

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