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Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

alaskapublic.org

121–130 of 187 posts

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#121
post #106
post #88

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Blaming “politicians” is a canard. People in Alaska want to develop their land for the same reason people in New York and California did—for economic development and jobs. If other folks value the wilderness so much, they should pay folks in Alaska not to develop their land.

> If other folks value the wilderness so much, they should pay folks in Alaska not to develop their land. We did. Congress used our tax dollars to purchase Alaska and then later on carved out part of that purchase as this reserve. It is in no way more their land than it is the New Yorker’s or the Californian’s.

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Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#122
post #50

Atrocious to me that anybody would want to block that road. A mine? Sure. Logging? Yup. Oil exploration? Yeah. A gravel road to an airport in Alaska? Come on. I haven't lived in Rural Alaska in 20 years but I was born and raised in a fishing village. People in the lower 48 have no understanding of the vastness of Alaska and how small a concession this really is. These specious environmental lawsuits are why no infras…

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Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#123

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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Your view seems fundamentally misanthropic - instead of autochthonous population having access to a resource that you take for granted, you would rather kick them out into an expensive urban area where their life is disrupted? All for a perceived risk to a comparitively tiny corridor?

and for no other reason than feeling good about oneself. I mean people are replying to a guy from Alaska

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#124
post #115
post #88

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Blaming “politicians” is a canard. People in Alaska want to develop their land for the same reason people in New York and California did—for economic development and jobs. If other folks value the wilderness so much, they should pay folks in Alaska not to develop their land.

> People in Alaska want to develop their land In many cases, the "people" who want to develop things are actually not people but rather businesses or agents of businesses. Go to rural or remote places which have been upgraded and you will find locals lamenting about the changes which invited industry. Many people like their environment undisturbed.

Businesses are just groups of people doing stuff, that hire people to do stuff and sell stuff to people. And you can go into San Francisco and find plenty of people who don’t want Silicon Valley businesses in the city, or people who complain about how NYC has become gentrified. But I bet if you took a vote “should tech companies all leave San Francisco for Texas” or “should NYC go back to the way it was in the 70s” that would be a land slide against losing those businesses.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#125
post #120

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How is this anything other than a slippery slope fallacy? Can you provide some examples of where the development of a rural, gravel road led to unstoppable, cancerous development?

It's not a fallacy. We have plenty of evidence. Human development, when not constrained by war, natural disasters, disease, lack of local resources, or inhospitable climate, is exponential.

Every human settlement ever started small. One road. One house. Then two houses. Three houses. One day, the land on which New York City sits today was rural, and then a road was made. The rest is history.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#126
Instead of fighting for the road to the airport they'd better fight for the electric VTOL - a way to get their air transport without violating the wilderness refuge.

Alaskan low density makes it a great place for the new technology to get tested in real use and have its early problems worked out.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#127
post #120

Earlier quoted context omitted.

How is this anything other than a slippery slope fallacy? Can you provide some examples of where the development of a rural, gravel road led to unstoppable, cancerous development?

It's not a fallacy. We have plenty of evidence. Human development, when not constrained by war, natural disasters, disease, lack of local resources, or inhospitable climate, is exponential. Every human settlement ever started small. One road. One house. Then two houses. Three houses. One day, the land on which New York City sits today was rural, and then a road was made. The rest is history.

How do you reconcile this with the fact that most modern nations are facing population decline? All sigmoidal curves look exponential until it plateaus.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#128
post #114

Earlier quoted context omitted.

>The good people of Alaska can do whatever they want, but if the concern is medical emergencies, they should seriously consider keeping a plane at the airport, illuminate the airport, and make sure the runway stays plowed. Anchorage is about 900 miles away. A helicopter ride over to cold bay, then on a plane to Anchorage might be easier if they can keep a pilots on hand. The issue is they can't get there.. the airpor…

I was unclear. Make the airport in king cove all weather. 4 miles out of town.

That’s vastly more expensive than the road. But this court case has also strayed well past being just about this specific road.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#129

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes because we realise the mistakes

Rules for thee not for me.

Yes, that unfortunately tends to be the way of it.

People can do things until they can't, I don't know what you're claiming otherwise.

Re: Jimmy Carter asks court to defend Alaska’s ‘unrivaled wilderness’

#130
post #73

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We built an interstate across an entire mountain range. Just because a road goes over a mountain does mean it can’t be easily possible at highway speeds.

Well, sure. but they're looking to put in a gravel road. king cove, population 757. I think you'd want a road grader to start, I don't see a quarry on the map, but maybe there's one near by. You could also move a rock crusher up there. I mean, it's fine, but gravel roads are kind of a pain. you have to keep adding more, year after year. I mean, you could pave it, but asphalt doesn't like freezing and thawing over and…

They want to connect to an all weather airport which would let them get to the trauma center more quickly and of course do other stuff.

The issue isn’t this specific road, it’s every other time someone wants to go through a wildlife refuge.

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