From Maruja Fuentes.

I don't know about the elbow rest portion, but the sitting spot has excellent potential for bus stops, DMV's and the like. That is to say, potential for very hip versions of those places.

Don't squeeze the Charmin...

As consumers become more and more numb to typically-blah advertising --even in contextually appropriate settings-- businesses are forced to speed up their hamster wheels in order to grab our attention. With varied statistics it's hard to tell how ad-saturated we really are, but this might give you an idea of what these ad execs are competing against:

The average American is exposed to 247 commercial messages each day. -Consumer Reports Website

Research tells us that the average American consumer is exposed tomore that 600 advertising messages a day in one form or another. -The Business Journal Phoenix

The average American is exposed to about 3000 advertising messages a day, and globally corporations spend over $620 billion each year to make their products seem desirable and to get us to buy them. -Michael Brower, PhD, and Warren Leon, PhD, Union of Concerned Scientists

A conservative estimate has the average American consumer exposed to more than 850 commercial messages a day. -Texas A&M University Digital Library

As a result, socially conscience and devilishly interactive advertising has been begun to break the marketing atmosphere, shattering the mold in order to evoke a consumer emotion far deeper than the buy me.

While more and more attention is being garnered by these organizations, big corporations are beginning to take notice. Check out these innovative advertisements by non-profits, governments, and social organizations, with a few green-washed billboards thrown in (see: McDonald's).

Click for bigger.

Cancer Patient Aid Association ceiling poster campaign:

For Amnesty International:

For The Salvation Army:

For Denver Water's "Use Only What You Need" Campaign:

For The Red Cross (with various other locations):

For the Focus 12 Rehab Center:

For a deforestation campaign (similar to WWF campaign pic below*)

For The World Wildlife Fund:


For Medicine Without Borders (one of my FAVORITES):

For endabuse.org

For a Stop Smoking Campaign in South America:

For a Greenpeace Global Warming campaign (incudes various other cities):

For Mothers Against Drunk Driving:

For the World Wildlife Fund:

*For the World Wildlife Fund:

Award-winning solar-powered billboard for NedBank in South Africa:

For the always-healthy McDonald's:

Cut-Outs for the Bronx Zoo:

For Amnesty International:

For Institute Akatu in Brazil:

For more information, check out adsoftheworld.com

Their taxis have masseuses...

What's the coolest (sorry) thing about the Wild Wadi Water Park in Dubai? As you can see from the picture below, it's definitely not the design. So what is it? The 33 metre high Jumeirah Sceirah water ride? Their Flowrider surfable wave? The Master Blaster uphill water roller coaster?

Nope. It's the air conditioned bus stop outside.

With more than 500 of them planned for the architecture-crazy city, everyone is crying environmental foul. Poppycock.

Numero Uno: Summer averages dance in triple digits, with the August record pushing 120 degrees! I think that would justify a need for air conditioning.

Numero Dos: They're installing these to help the environment.

What?

Yep. Help the environment. Think about it. How many bus takers are going to wake up, put on their kandura, and wait for 30 minutes in 112 degree weather? Not to mention, traffic jams are already commonplace in Dubai. Just last year, the situation was so bad that they started using satellites to monitor the city streets. And while a new interchange for the Dubai Marina and Emirates Hills is alleviating a portion of the problem, the city continues to expand at more-than-rapid pace.

The Jumeriah Beach Residence has more than 6,000 residential units and the Jumeirah Lake Towers are on the other side of Sheikh Zayed Road. The Palm Jumeriah has 3,000 villas. There's 50+ story residences like the 21st Century Tower. You've got the Jumeirah Emirates Towers Hotel. There's tourism at the Burj and plenty of other people staying at one of the many 1,000 unit 5-star hotels. Hoardes of people working and living in 60+ story buildings, like the Rose Tower, Al Yaquob Tower, and the HHH Tower.

That's a lot of people in one place.

The Salik road tolls are in place and, as mentioned, the interchange is alleviating some problems. But the Dubai Metro ($3.89 Billion!), the abras, and the city streets are only going to be able to handle so much. The more people on the bus, the better.