Results tagged “mailmanschool”

Yesterday we mentioned that a cache of weapons - including a number of pipe bombs - were found in a Remsen Street apartment in Brooklyn Heights. Now it turns out the apartment was shared by an ex-con and a professor at Columbia University!

Earlier this week, Columbia University's Mailman School of Public Health released a study that shows New Yorkers who "reside in densely populated, pedestrian-friendly areas have significantly lower body mass index levels compared to other New Yorkers." In other words, those people who rely on their feet, rather than other New Yorkers who live in the more spacious parts of the outer boroughs, tend to be thinner.

Columbia University released some more results from its World Trade Center Evacuation Study, and the Daily News translates the findings' recommendation as "Don't wait, don't ask, just go." We found this slide from a presentation (here's the PDF) Mailman School of Public Health Principal Researcher Robyn Gershon gave that has stats on what 2000 people did before leaving the World Trade Center - and many of them waited a few minutes before actually leaving by doing things like changing shoes and shutting down a computer. Gershon told the News that some of those survivors "literally got out as the buildings were collapsing and climbed out of the buildings."

Columbia's Mailman School of Public Health says that your daily subway commute can be hazardous to your hearing. Dr. Robyn Gershon announced the findings of a study which found that noise from the platform and inside cars exceeds safe limits. We suppose that listening to intense jackhammering and construction while waiting for weekend subway service also puts us at risk. Here's some interesting news from the study:

Average and maximum noise measurements were made using a precision sound level meter on subway platforms located in the four New York boroughs with underground subways (Manhattan, Brooklyn, the Bronx, and Queens). The average maximum noise level on subway platforms measured was 94 decibels (dBA). The average maximum inside of subway cars was 95 dBA, and at bus stops, the average maximum was 84 dBA. For comparison, approximate levels of familiar sounds are: 45-60 dBA for normal conversation, 100 dBA for a chainsaw and 140 dBA for a gunblast. The logarithmic nature of decibels means that every 10 dBA equals a 10 fold increase in intensity. Thus a 90 dBA sound is 10 times as intense as an 80 dBA sound.

Continue reading "News Flash: The Subway is LOUD"