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matthew-cook.bsky.social
Rotterdam resident, British born. Architecture trained, working in urban design/planning. Interested in architecture, cities, ecology, politics. Ik moet mijn Nederlands meer gebruiken.
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In the waiting room and they are building an extension out the back. My smart brain knows I can hear a hammer drill and falling masonry, my ape brain is asking what the hell they are doing to the poor guy who went in in front of me

submitted 4 days ago • 0 comments

Got chatting to a designer of subsea electric interconnecters yesterday. Apparently sabotage is annoying but not that big a deal right now, the cables are designed expecting they only work 80% of the time. The real pain is GPS spoofing as you don't even know your gps is wrong...

submitted 8 days ago • 1 comment

Adult life just becomes really wanting to have a sit down at a certain point doesn't it

submitted 21 days ago • 0 comments

As I got onto the metro yesterday evening, the doors opened and a pigeon stepped out the train in front of me, like any regular underground commuter

submitted 27 days ago • 0 comments

Following the 3rd runway announcement BBC producers of huge infrastructure project documentaries must be breathing a sigh of relief. Now Crossrail and the Thames supersewer are completed, and Hinckley C well underway, a shortage was looming

submitted 40 days ago • 0 comments

If the elderly are to downsize and free up all the spare rooms they need good, inexpensive homes that are easy to care for and to be cared for in. They should be built in places where people can keep their social networks and routines. This requires building more homes!

submitted 40 days ago • 0 comments

Een wekenlang kapotte lift en roltrappen die de meeste dagen niet in gebruik zijn. Blijdorp metrohalte is erg diep en nu ontoegankelijk voor veel mensen, maar ik zie geen oplossing onderweg vanaf RET

submitted 41 days ago • 0 comments

I forgot how tiring the full force of waking up, looking at the news, and going 'oh FFS what now' was, despite never actually being free of it the last four years

submitted 48 days ago • 0 comments

Ah, the Wim Hof Methode

submitted 53 days ago • 1 comment

Always enjoy peering into skips and seeing what buildings were made from. It's quite common to see reeds round here, used during plastering. Despite the neighbourhood's modern plan, wattle and daub was still the preferred technique in the 30s

submitted 57 days ago • 0 comments

Listening to the lads at @about-buildings.bsky.social talk about the state of architecture, one comment, about most modern buildings being horrible, jumped out at me. I don't know if it is true, especially looking from outside the UK

submitted 61 days ago • 2 comments

How does the UK function without an agreed side of the pavement to pass each other on? Dutchies pass on the right hand side, but back home over Christmas I felt like I was dodging people all the way down the street

submitted 63 days ago • 0 comments

Realising this is far down the list of possible solutions, but why don't we have cars that stop driving once they detect they have hit something or someone?

submitted 79 days ago • 0 comments

This week I have been helping my dad put a sheep net fence inside my parents' hedge. This is not a sensible task. I basically live in the hedge now.

submitted 69 days ago • 0 comments

Travelling by rail, sea, and road today to get back to the UK for Christmas. Luckily Oscar loves the metro and isn't a bad traveller generally

submitted 78 days ago • 1 comment

Realising this is far down the list of possible solutions, but why don't we have cars that stop driving once they detect they have hit something or someone?

submitted 79 days ago • 0 comments

Walked by the zoo this morning and Van Ravesteyn's gate house was looking rather pretty in the dawn sun

submitted 80 days ago • 1 comment

i thought i had signed up to read about my favourite deeply strange man, the owner of Samuel Smith pubs, turns out its yet another storey of broken UK planning and the power of big money overwhelming the system www.theguardian.com/news/2024/de...

submitted 80 days ago • 0 comments

Every new years the Dutch go absolutely bananas for fireworks. The explosions start around October but gets so bad that mid December they have to board up glass panels and eventually seal shut bins & postboxes. My metro station boarded up this weekend

submitted 81 days ago • 0 comments

When I was 3 I remember seeing our local police station & magistrates court on the lunchtime news. Only work out years later it was the pre-trial hearing for rose west

submitted 82 days ago • 0 comments