If you were to log in, you'd be able to get more information on your fellow community member.
Lots of good info, but would point out that global warming is a farce - as you should know, with your CS degree, that the mathematical models used on even the biggest supercomputers like the one in Japan are not complex enough to give accurate results (for instance, there is no accurate model for the 75% of the earth's surface that is covered by water in terms of what the ocean will do with more heat). Was also a little surprised that you did not mention the more evangelical or fundamentalist Christians in the USA who are very strongly pro-Israel. The State Dept and often the President's close advisors in times past have wanted to throw away the US-Israel relationship but have been stopped in part by the 20 or 30 million pro-Israel folks represented by Dobson, Falwell, etc.
I would suggest you have a look at http://www.malcolmwells.com - look at the "Bipad" design, which is a single person's, earth sheltered, 320 swuare foot house design with lots of glass.Aside from mixing some distilled water with some vinegar and using that to clean the south-facing glass, outside maintenance will be minimal since most of the building is covered with dirt. You might need to mow the roof, but adding a friendly goat to keep your Samoyed company could eliminate that chore. Since the entire south wall will be mostly glass I would say that views should be nice. You could add an earth-sheltered glass atrium/sunroom on the north side to get light in both ends, and have a sheltered patio like area to boot.
I suggest the use of optical encoding on the surface of the runways and taxi areas itself. A simple low-resolution camera on the underside of the plane (or even beside the pilot's window in a smaller plane) would suffice. Maintenance would be minimal (just paint) and there is so much ground that high tolerances (read: dpi of resolution) would not be required. That way, the pilot could know where he was to be at all times, and an alarm could sound if the optical encoding indicated that he was on the wrong section of road. As well, any other equipment traveling over the surface could also read the same information.
Phil, if the DNS server inside the ActionTec is not very responsive, you may wish to try using e.g. OpenDNS.com's DNS, or even find a friend with a Unix/Linux server on the Intnernet to set up a caching nameserver that you can use.
re LA Villages - you have to solve the problem that in the USA, every street must be wide enough for 2 fire trucks to pass each other - if you don't you won't be able to insure any of the property. Possibly engineering a different solution might add $10-20 million (as a guess, design places for pumper trucks to plug in to the underground pipe system nearby but not on that street) , but the real hurdle will be the building codes and the ability to get the insurance companies to write insurance on the affected properties.