Image by Tono Balaguer/ Adobe

Blue

Aerial trams are a green mode of transportation with the potential to bring additional public benefits to Boston. Paris will have an aerial tramway by 2025. Medellín’s, operating since 2004, moves tens of thousands of passengers daily. And Mexico City is fostering public art in one of its more majestic forms: muralism.

Boston

sky

Transportation: Let’s gondola, Boston!

Given that the T is currently in shambles, it’s hard to ignore the enormous potential that 70 cable cars, with the capacity to transport up to 4,000 people per hour, could hold to alleviate worsening Boston traffic today.

By Marcela García

Cars on Mexico’s newest cableway passed a colorful mural by artist Hugo Jocka on a multistory building in the Iztapalapa borough of Mexico City. Luis Antonio Rojas/The New York Times

Marcela García is a Globe columnist. She can be reached at marcela.garcia@globe.com. Follow her on Twitter @marcela_elisa and on Instagram @marcela_elisa.

A mother and her two young children ride inside a glass-sided gondola, with businesses and streets far below.

In this long view of the Iztapalapa borough of Mexico City, blue-trimmed boxed gondola cars cruise above a dense colorful neighborhood extending far into the distance under a smoggy sky. On a nearby building is a large mural of a smiling woman with colorful leaves and flowers.

Indeed, when developers from Millennium Partners floated a project to build a $100 million gondola system on the South Boston waterfront in 2018, Bostonians shut down the novel proposal with a classic conservative instinct that reminds us why we last saw transportation innovation in the 1890s, when the nation’s first underground subway system opened in the city. In retrospect, given that the T is currently in shambles, it’s hard to ignore the enormous potential that those 70 cable cars, with the capacity to transport up to 4,000 people per hour, held to alleviate worsening Boston traffic today.

A rendering of the view across Fort Point Channel for a proposed Boston Cableway project. Handel Architects via City of Boston

In 2018, gondolas were dismissed as an “insane” idea, with reports that Massachusetts Port Authority officials rolled their eyes at the proposal behind closed doors. To be sure, it’s not just Boston that has rejected gondolas. Similar proposals in cities like Austin, Chicago, and Seattle have not moved past the concept stage. In general, transit enthusiasts and experts have dismissed cable-car systems in the United States as a distraction from bigger problems facing urban transportation systems — the ultimate shiny (flying) object in transit. Let’s face it: The streets are clogged and the MBTA tracks are in disrepair. Maybe it’s time to take to the sky. Is it the name? Do gondolas need a rebranding? Is it that these systems scream “whimsical theme park ride” instead of “efficient and alternative transportation solution”?

Miriam Martinez and her children rode the Mexicable in Ecatepec de Morelos, Mexico. The gondola-based transport system was opened in 2016. Anthony Vazquez for The Boston Globe

By Paulo Rocha

Skyline: The future of architecture in Boston

By Marcela García

Transportation: Let’s gondola, Boston!

By LaShyra “Lash” Nolen

Superlative students: Credit for being good humans

By Johanna Chao Kreilick

Science fair: The 2030 Boston Science Expo where anything is possible

It’s 2050. Nearly three decades have passed since the Center for Computing & Data Sciences at Boston University first opened its doors to a flood of students and educators. At the time, it was hailed as a groundbreaking project, setting the stage for the achievement of major climate action goals by both Boston University and the City of Boston. The building’s design centered on values of sustainability and enhancement of the well-being of those working and learning inside.

Some called it “the Jenga building,” others called it “the stacked books building,” and Mayor Michelle Wu said the center set an example for the entire country. The largest operationally fossil-fuel free building at the time, it set a new standard for buildings in Boston and inspired people to think of towers and city-building in a non-traditional way. Future construction followed in its footsteps, and it became one of many buildings that show what can be achieved when design and sustainability merge.

Now it’s almost 30 years later. It’s incredible to see that the City of Boston has achieved its goal of carbon neutrality through strong leadership and unwavering dedication to combatting the climate crisis. This feat has had a profound impact on the future of architecture, not just in Boston but in cities across the globe. Today, we bear witness to impressive buildings that give more than they take — buildings that are beautiful and give back to the environment and embody the true intention of sustainable living. One glance around the city is all it takes to see a carbon-neutral future reflected on its skyline. A skyline dotted with climate-responsive towers of all sizes; truly smart facades with integrated photovoltaic panels that capture the sun’s energy to generate power; buildings in varying heights constructed from mass timber, low-carbon concrete, recycled steel, and reclaimed building materials; and sky gardens and landscaped terraces that promote healthy living with immediate access to the outdoors and natural ventilation (yes, operable windows on tall towers).

Paulo Rocha is a partner at KPMB Architects.

By Paulo Rocha

Boston University’s new "Jenga Building," a 19-story tower overlooking the Charles River, is the largest net-zero carbon building in Boston. David L Ryan/Globe Staff

The One Post Office Square building received a makeover and enviro-friendly upgrade. David L Ryan/Globe Staff

Above: Fenway Farms, launched in 2015, is a 5,000-square-foot rooftop farm in Fenway Park. Matthew J. Lee/Globe staff Left: Kale grows at Fenway Farms in 2022. Stan Grossfeld/ Globe staff

In this image taken from the street looking upward, the One Post Office Square tower consists of tall glass panes until about halfway up. Above that you can see the traditional light brick with many small windows, a style that is typical of downtown Boston buildings. The right side of the glass bottom half is accented by a grid of thick red beams.

The exterior of Boston University’s “Jenga building” looks like glass-covered slabs haphazardly stacked on top of one another.

Dreaming of a future in which we bear witness to impressive buildings that give more than they take — buildings that are beautiful and give back to the environment and embody the true intention of sustainable living.

Skyline: The future of architecture in Boston

Welcome to the Boston Science Expo we urgently need, and one my colleagues and I at the Union of Concerned Scientists are working to make possible. It’s 2030 and thousands have gathered at the Roxbury Innovation Center to see the latest projects developed here that are building a better world for all by meeting the US goal of reducing global warming emissions by half. A crowd has formed at a local environmental justice group’s exhibit showcasing its design for a solar-powered microgrid with battery storage. The project does double duty by reducing fossil fuel pollution and serving as an emergency energy hub for residents during outages. It’s part of a broader effort in which several Massachusetts communities have worked with the state and Congress to access grants and low-interest loans to allow homeowners to use their rooftop space for solar, get fairly paid for the energy their panels produce, and pay back energy efficiency and solar installation costs via their monthly utility bills.

Johanna Chao Kreilick is president of the Union of Concerned Scientists.

By Johanna Chao Kreilick

Speculative photo illustration/Mr.Everrest/Adobe

This is a future we absolutely can create.

Science fair: The 2030 Boston Science Expo where anything is possible

Like most college students, I was an overachiever; honor roll every year, presidential scholar, and a Harvard-bound premedical student. I was proud of my academic accomplishments — mostly because they were a reflection of the incredible community that helped me achieve them. But I always felt like my A in organic chemistry didn’t

Today there is no standardized way colleges evaluate for these characteristics, but what if we could change that? What if students like me were evaluated for the quality community member we were becoming in addition to the quality professional we would become? What if students were pushed to use our talents to promote equity in our society? What if students were encouraged to build community and meaningfully contribute to the community around us? Many students already do this work, but their efforts are often seen by their schools and potential employers — even society itself — as trivial soft skills or pet projects that aren’t valued as much as their academic accomplishments. It’s time to change that and here’s how Boston could be the first to do it.

LaShyra “Lash” Nolen is a fourth-year MD/MPP dual-degree student at Harvard Medical School and Harvard Kennedy School of Government, where she serves as student council president for the medical school class of 2023. She is founder and executive director of the We Got Us Empowerment Project.

By LaShyra “Lash” Nolen

Karter Hardeman, 7, (left), and Janayla Ralsey, 8, (center), read with volunteer Joshua Banks (right) during an after-school literacy program in Atlanta on April 6. Alex Slitz/AP

Platt High School student Sam Bergeron, 17, removed a rotting baseball bat along the Hanover Pond Trail in Meriden, Conn., as part of a community service project with several other student volunteers on Oct. 15, 2020. Dave Zajac/Record-Journal via AP

University of Mississippi Medical Center student volunteers, including Praise Seo (left) and Aram Seo, assembled nasal swab kits in March 2020. Jay Ferchaud/The University of Mississippi Medical Center, via AP

Two women in black University of Mississippi Medical Center jackets sit at a long metal lab table concentrating on medical wrappings and long blue swab sticks before them.

A young woman wearing a COVID mask, black leggings, a Friends t-shirt, a white unzipped hoodie, and latex gloves picks up a rotting baseball bat on a leafy roadside. Green trees shade her and her companion in the background from the summer sun.

A young man sits on a black couch in a classroom; student desks can be seen in the background. The man, wearing a white t-shirt and light denim jeans, is showing a picture book to two children; one wearing a black t-shirt and the other a pink t-shirt with colorful leggings and a colorful purse. The children seem enthralled by what he is saying.

What if students like me were evaluated for the quality community member we were becoming in addition to the quality professional we would become?

Superlative students: Credit for being good humans

Tell us your blue sky vision for Boston

I envision three criteria that colleges could use to evaluate students’ humanity: community, personal health, and equity. The community domain would consist of evaluating how a student demonstrates empathy and care toward their classmates and local community. This could look like sharing helpful learning resources or notes with a sick classmate. At the local community level, it could be launching a project to find solutions for the displacement of residents by student housing expansions. Recognizing such efforts would help students get out of the individualistic mindset that shapes contemporary college education and move us back into a space of collective community care. Community care would also extend to self-care through personal health that would evaluate how students prioritize their health and wellness. Instead of the all-nighter culture that plagues college campuses today, students would be rewarded for healthy behaviors such as aiming for eight hours of sleep each night and taking time to be in nature. They would also be rewarded for not answering e-mails outside of work hours and saying “no” to requests that don’t advance their personal mission. Creating these healthy boundaries will help students become more whole human beings — and respect boundaries set by their colleagues and loved ones too.

Colleges would also reward global social justice advocacy. This domain would evaluate efforts for allyship and advocacy for minoritized and marginalized groups. Advocating for improved accessibility measures for students with disabilities or holding professors accountable for problematic statements made in class about minoritized groups would empower students to carry equity forward into the workplace. Active advocacy would help turn the idea of equity into praxis and encourage students to start taking tangible steps to support vulnerable communities. An evaluation system like this can help us rethink the objective of college and set us on a path to create educational systems geared toward healing ourselves and our society. Today, college students are especially in need of healing, as levels of isolation, depression, and anxiety continue to rise — driven in part by the expectation for efficiency and perfectionism in a world with increasing problems. It would be naive to think changing the way college students are evaluated alone would change this, but perhaps if success in college meant also getting credit for being a well-balanced and decent human being, the stakes for academic perfectionism wouldn’t be so high and the world’s crises so plentiful.

completely capture the richness of my educational experience or the ways I hoped to use it to make the world a better place. Similarly, my grades didn’t evaluate the important life skills I was developing, such as my ability to recognize and combat inequities, set healthy personal boundaries, or care for my community.

Flying into Boston, you have a bird’s-eye view of a city that is just as lush from above as it is from street level, with an extension of Frederick Law Olmsted’s Emerald Necklace rising into the skyline. The rooftops, both old and new, are now adorned with green roofs and urban farms, proof that we know green spaces and biodiversity in urban areas are vital. At street level, the city is more porous and interconnected. New buildings blur the boundaries between indoor and outdoor spaces in a bid to expand the public realm. The streets, now lined with more trees, create a refreshing environment for new buildings that pay homage to the city’s rich historic heritage. The result is a welcoming and diverse urban center that embraces its past while looking toward a bright and sustainable future.

What’s not to like? A similar concept can work here in Boston, particularly now that Mayor Michelle Wu has hired a mural consultant for the city. It’s a three-year contract, at more than $3 million, to pay artists and cover other costs to beautify certain areas. The innovative consultancy — a great move — is funded by American Rescue Plan Act money, the pandemic-era federal relief package. Far from being an outlandish, unpractical idea, gondolas are the future of urban transportation. And the sky’s not the limit, for they hold a unique potential to transform both public transit and the landscape of the city. Boston, let’s rise above and embrace them.

Consider the Cablebús in Mexico City. Inaugurated more than two years ago, it’s the longest gondola system in Latin America at roughly 6.5 miles, according to government officials. It’s not the first cableway in the city that’s home to more than 9 million people. But what makes the Cablebús special is not its massive capacity to move about 90,000 people each day. Instead, it’s a grand, colorful element. As passengers ride high in the cabins, they can see murals painted on rooftops along the route of the cable system: a giant monarch butterfly on top of a purple flower or a girl in a red dress with a yellow background, a content expression on her face. What’s more, these vibrant murals were painted by local artists. The line runs along Iztapalapa, among the poorest areas of Mexico City. With the murals, the idea was to turn the vast neighborhood into a public art gallery.

The sky-high, sustainable public transportation mode has been embraced elsewhere but somehow shunned in America (outside the ski slopes, that is).

The nurses lounge in Boston Children's Hospital's rooftop garden in 2018. Jessica Rinaldi/Globe Staff

Several nurses sit on brightly colored chairs on a wooden deck; a sunshade offers protection from the bright sunny day. Trees in planters are placed here and there, and a pool-sized grassy area beckons nearby.

The foreground is occupied by healthy large curly kale leaves with the green exterior of the Fenway Park stands in the background.

A woman stands on a ladder painting a mural of a little girl. The girl, depicted from shoulders up, has black hair, dark skin, and is wearing a white sleeveless shirt with ties at the shoulders; she is looking forward in a smiling and confident way. The background is magenta with two large, bold teal blue flower-like shapes.

A woman painted a mural on the Camino Mujeres Libres y Seguras in the Iztapalapa district of Mexico City. Marco Ugarte/AP

Impressive booths dedicated to offshore wind also are drawing interest. New Bedford port officials are especially pleased to share how they’ve helped Massachusetts lead the nation by developing one of the most advanced port complexes to support the now-booming offshore wind industry. Gleaming displays show models of the port, replete with nearby manufacturing plants for offshore wind parts, a staging area full of turbine components ready to head out to sea, and miniatures of the customized freighters designed for planting the turbine’s foundations on the ocean floor, attaching the towers, and assembling the turbines on top. Another Bay State first is also on display: A networked regional offshore transmission system — connecting multiple offshore wind farms, improving reliability, and reducing the number of cables in the ocean and places where they come ashore — connects to the grid and the newest generation of low-cost batteries at the former Brayton Point power plant site in Somerset. The new battery design, developed by Massachusetts-based chemists, requires less lithium, cobalt, and other transition minerals than batteries of the past.

A grid of small solar arrays panels, attached to a futuristic-looking tower with shiny black knobs and wiring, reflect a brilliant yellow sun in this speculative photo illustration.

As I weave my way through the Expo, I see some of what this bountiful offshore clean energy hub is helping to provide to our region. The Massachusetts Bay Transportation Authority is showcasing plans for its modernized, flexible transit system: clean, new trains and buses running every five minutes, completely accessible for people with mobility disabilities and parents pushing strollers, and all powered by electricity. People using the MBTA can log onto a website or use an app to learn how to access public transportation in combination with electric bikeshare or, in the future, self-driving rideshare to get to their destinations.

Speculative photo illustration/XaMaps/Adobe

A man in silhouette lifts his hand to his eyes to see a complicated circular pattern of lines, shapes, and symbols in blue and purple splayed across the dark night sky in this speculative photo illustration. In the middle distance are a series of wind turbines against a very colorful landscape of hills.

Local companies from Arlington to Yarmouth are touting their success in achieving net-zero carbon emissions. Several booths display “agrivoltaic” projects created by farmer cooperatives in conjunction with utilities. These farms across the state integrate crops, grazing animals, and solar panel arrays. The arrangement has helped reduce tensions around land use. Healthy soil from agroecological farming practices enable farmland to store more carbon, better withstand the cycles of drought and heavy rains commonplace with climate change, and make polluting farm runoff a thing of the past.

Speculative photo illustration/tonktiti/Adobe

Speculative photo illustration/XaMaps/Adobe

A 3-D tear-shaped location marker rises above a close-up of a city grid image on a cell phone, while city lights twinkle blurred in the background in this speculative photo illustration.

We’ll need to significantly ramp up our current efforts, but this 2030 Boston Science Expo of my imagination is a future we absolutely can create. When we do, we’ll see Boston reap huge rewards from solidifying its role as a global leader in clean energy development and its equitable deployment.

Brilliant golden sun hits large ripe wheat berries on stalks in this speculative photo illustration.

A sleek, modern gondola is seen in the foreground as a tree-covered hill extends toward a bridge over the Willamette River in the distance.

A tram in Portland, Ore., heads to the Oregon Health and Science University. Leah Nash/The New York Times

Nicholls State University graduate student Katie Gray works to pull a black mangrove seedling from its pot during a volunteer planting on Queen Bess Island, La.. Halle Parker/The Times-Picayune/The New Orleans Advocate via AP

A person in jeans, unbuttoned flannel shirt, and white and blue baseball cap kneels in sandy-looking solid, surrounded by sparsely planted saplings. The bright summer sun beams down from the sky.

Above: Fenway Farms, launched in 2015, is a 5,000-square-foot rooftop farm in Fenway Park. Matthew J. Lee/Globe staff Left: Kale grows at Fenway Farms in 2022. Stan Grossfeld/Globe staff

Project editor: Amy MacKinnon Design: Heather Hopp-Bruce Audience engagement: Deanna Schwartz Copy editor: Jessie Tremmel

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