Construction Lorries Face Ban From London Roads

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orries will be banned from London unless they are fitted with safety equipment to protect cyclists and pedestrians.

London Mayor Boris Johnson confirmed today that bans can now be ordered across the capital for non-compliant vehicles.

Johnson said: “I am pleased to say that after negotiations with London Councils, we can now combine our powers to propose a simple and comprehensive ban.”

The ban is set to come into force as early as September and will focus on construction lorries, tipper trucks and cement mixers.

It will require every vehicle in London over 3.5 tonnes to be fitted with sideguards to protect cyclists from being dragged under the wheels.

It will also require them to be fitted with mirrors giving the driver a better view of cyclists and pedestrians around their vehicles.

Anfield Stadium Expansion Moves A Step Closer

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iverpool City Council has published a consultation document for the planned £260m regeneration of Anfield.

Plans to extend Anfield stadium to a 55,000 capacity ground are at the heart of the wider regeration proposals.

Liverpool City Council is working with Your Housing Group, Liverpool Football Club and Keepmoat on the plans which include also include new housing, shopping facilities, public space, office buildings, a hotel and a new pedestrian-friendly avenue and public square.

Liverpool FC managing director, Ian Ayre, said: “The publication of the draft document is another important milestone in the regeneration project as we continue this exciting journey to transform the Anfield area.

TIDBIT

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hina now has over one million millionaires, and more residents with wealth above USD 50 million than any other country except the USA. 
                
                                  -         Credit Suisse Global Wealth Report 2013

Syrian Government Demolishes Thousands Of Homes: Report

Caroline Alexander

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yrian government forces using bulldozers and explosives razed thousands of homes in rebel areas of the country -- an area equivalent to about 200 soccer fields, according to a report by Human Rights Watch.

Many of the demolished buildings were apartment blocks several stories high, some with as many as eight levels, covering a total area of at least 145 hectares (358 acres), the New York-based organization said in a report today titled “Razed to the Ground: Syria’s Unlawful Neighborhood Demolitions.” Satellite photos released by the organization showed inhabited areas in Damascus and Hama reduced to rubble, some in the space of a month.

“In some areas, the entire neighborhood has been flattened, it disappeared as if it never even existed,” Ole Solvang, emergencies researcher at Human Rights Watch, said in an interview. The destruction is not a consequence of fighting, “We can tell from the satellite imagery that it is systematic and complete,” he said.

Brooklyn Billionaire: How One Man Made A Fortune Rebuilding Dumbo

 Cash crises, political grudge matches, suicide. None of it stopped David Walentas from forging a ten-digit fortune by creating an entire neighborhood in New York’s underdog borough. And he’s about to do it all again.

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IDDEN UNDER THE ICONIC BROOKLYN and Manhattan suspension bridges, a neighborhood little-known outside New York glistens like a movie set, if that flick combined On the Waterfront with Sex and the City. In Brooklyn’s Dumbo the streets are carved from cobblestones, the hulking industrial edifices ooze prewar charm and approximately one-quarter of the companies leading the Big Apple’s design and tech boom, including West Elm and Etsy, lie within, alongside art galleries, artisanal shops and boutiques with precious names like Peas & Pickles and Recycle-a-Bicycle. The spacious apartment lofts, many with spectacular water views, rent and sell for higher prices than many of their Manhattan equivalents.

In a city that has thrived for three centuries on capitalist chaos, the architect of this urban perfection, concocted with the detailed obsession of a Disney imagineer, sits in a windowless sixth-floor conference room. Nothing in Dumbo is accidental, and it’s all the product of David Walentas.

Thirty-five years ago Walentas borrowed $12 million to buy 2 million square feet of this neighborhood–the lion’s share of what was then a dying industrial district filled with under-used warehouses. Today you can find one of his firm’s Dumbo apartments, a swank penthouse in a vintage clock tower, listed at $15 million. Even after selling off 700,000 square feet of the initial parcel and later accumulating more property, his 2.3-million-square-foot portfolio plus other assets, factoring in debt, makes Walentas worth an estimated $1.4 billion. Manhattan has produced numerous real estate tycoons , and a few have made fortunes building for the masses in places like Queens. But Walentas is the first billionaire to ever make his money almost entirely in New York’s coolest borough.

What NMRC Has To Offer Low Income Earners, Affordable Housing

Nigeria

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ith its launch recently by the Federal Government, the Nigerian Mortgage Refinance Corporation (NMRC) has come to stay as an integral part of the country’s financial system, with special focus on housing finance and/or the mortgage system.

NMRC was established with the primary aim of resolving access to affordable housing finance and, more importantly, as a focal point for creating an enabling environment for housing finance by playing a strong developmental role in supporting the improvement of land and legal framework and housing development and construction.

The company, which sits as a financial intermediary between the Nigerian capital market and financial institutions that provide mortgage loans to average working Nigerian citizens, is the new hope for low-income earners who currently cannot afford the cost of a mortgage loan.

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New-Home Sales Jumped 16 Percent In 2013

U.S

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ew-home sales increased by 16.4 percent in 2013, rising to 428,000 from 368,000 in 2012, according to data released jointly Monday by the U.S. Census Bureau and the Department of Housing and Urban Development.

In December 2013, they fell by 7 percent month over month to a seasonally adjusted annual rate of 414,000 from a November revised rate of 445,000, the report said. But on an annual basis, sales of new single-family homes increased by 4.5 percent.

However, sales of single-family houses at year-end [December] fell to 414, 000, according to estimates released. This is 7.0 percent (±17.5%) below the revised November rate of 445,000, but is 4.5 percent (±19.8%) above the December 2012 estimate of 396,000.

See U.S Census Bureau