Brian Rademaekers

Philadelphia

Writer| Editor | Environmental Communications

Brian Rademaekers

Philadelphia

Writer| Editor | Environmental Communications

AH, MAN: A career-spanning conversation with JACK ROSE by Brian Rademaekers (from Arthur No. 33)
A career-spanning conversation with JACK ROSE, American musician, recorded just a few months before he died in 2009. When I started covering music in Philadelphia in 2007, my beat—the city’s crumbling post-industrial river wards—felt like a veritable nexus of weird folk and psychedelic experimentation.
Record-Setting ‘Sojourn’ Highlights the Schuylkill River’s Wild Beauty
If you happened to be in Philadelphia admiring the Schuylkill River’s picturesque beauty from afar last week, you might have been startled by what appeared to be an enormous flock of florescent birds, all of them rhythmically flapping their wings on the shimmering water: Those “birds,” of course, were actually the 100-plus paddlers propelling the rainbow of brightly hued kayaks and canoes that made up the annual Schuylkill Sojourn.
Hard-Working Mussels
When you think of mussels in Philadelphia, your first thought might be of ordering moules-frites, Belgium’s signature dish, from Monk’s Café. Ecologist Danielle Kreeger and a team of volunteers is trying to add another association. They want you to think of the Tacony-Frankford Creek, whose swampy terminus is at the Delaware River in Northeast Philadelphia, where the once plentiful mussel is being reintroduced.
Grid
Exploring the Seedy Side of Philadelphia: Heirloom seed-savers are preserving our area’s rich horticultural heritage
story by Brian Rademaekers | photos by Rob Cardillo. I had one of those moments this winter while looking through the glossy pages of a seed catalog. Among the hundreds of pages of colorful fruits, flowers and vegetables, a particular plant caught my attention: the Fish Pepper. With distinct white-striped leaves and young green fruit, the pepper bush was interesting in on a purely visual level.
Grid
Living next to a nightmare
In the river wards, there is no shortage of stories about nightmare neighbors — from hoarders to party houses to drug hangouts — who can make life on certain blocks almost unbearable for everyone else. But for Michael and Laura Tepper, their nightmare stems from a lack of a neighbor. When the couple moved into their home on Sergeant Street near Trenton Avenue in 2006, they were happy to meet Robert Brown, an older man who lived in the house next door.
Rio vs. Philly: Our Water Quality Wins By a Mile
With all eyes on Brazil for the 2016 Summer Olympics, one big health concern right up there with the Zika virus is the water quality in rivers, bays and surf around Rio de Janeiro. While athletes no doubt would prefer to focus their attention on winning, the risk of getting violently ill from the very water they’ll compete in and on is a serious hurdle aquatic athletes will have to contend with this year.
Ever Green: Local cemetery provides options for a clean getaway
s rolling, manicured lawns, the one-acre “Nature’s Sanctuary” might not seem unusual. But this little plot is the only cemetery space in the Philadelphia region listed by the. (GBC) as an approved provider, and even earned the group’s highest rating of three leaves. GBC founder Joe Sehee says that, while it's considered a “hybrid” cemetery because of the surrounding 186 acres of conventional burial plots, West Laurel Hill provides an important starting point and is doing things right by starting out small.
Grid
Save Money Now: It’s easier than ever to retrofit your house, room by room
Everyone wants to live in a home that is comfortable and energy efficient. The best way to get there is to look at your house as a whole. That's the approach embraced by programs like EnergySense from Philadelphia Gas Works (PGW) and Smart Ideas from PECO. These programs include rebates, incentives, educa-tional programs, energy audits and even free energy-saving items.
Grid
Soak It Up! [#052 Special]
This insert was created by Grid in partnership with the Community Design Collaborative, the Philadelphia Water Department and the Environmen...
La Papillote, Culinary Institute of America
Sister Rosetta Tharpe: Addressing a Grave Injustice
Now-deceased Sister Rosetta Tharpe is regarded as gospel music’s first superstar. But you would hardly know it by the way she was laid to rest in North Philadelphia after her 1973 death.
Northeast Times
Drinking Water Gets a Drug Test
Federal scientists surveying fish in the Potomac River continue to find smallmouth bass with a freakish quirk: The males are making eggs and sperm. Researchers suspect that these “intersex” bass are victims of a newly recognized form of pollution: trace amounts of pharmaceuticals and other chemicals flushed down toilets or flowing from farms’ animal waste.
The Philadelphia Inquirer
Infrastructure Spotlight: Modernizing Philly's Biggest Pump Station
Torresdale Filtered Water Pumping Station is about to get its biggest makeover since it was constructed more than 70 years ago. A long-serving hub of infrastructure, the station supplies nearly one-quarter of the city with millions of gallons of clean drinking water each day.
@PhillyH2O Blog

About

Brian Rademaekers

Writing

Editing

Copyeditor

Social media

Community Outreach

Live video

Digital photography/editing

Homebrewing

Cooking

Urban gardening

Brian Rademaekers is an award-winning journalist and editor from Philadelphia specializing in community reporting and environmental issues. Rademaekers graduated from Temple University with a degree in journalism in 2006 after working as an intern with the Philadelphia Inquirer's health and science team. In his first full time reporting job, he wrote five or more stories per week covering Philadelphia's neighborhoods for the Star and Northeast Times newspapers.

After being promoted to managing editor and serving in that role for three years, he joined Xfinity.com's digital news operation in 2011. He is currently a communications consultant, writing the Watersheds Blog at Phillywatersheds.org and supporting social media outreach for the innovative Philadelphia Water Department.

A longtime urban environmentalist, his work has appeared in the Philadelphia Inquirer, Grid Magazine and Arthur.