So many of the problems we've made seem like they could be great fixed by less people instead of more each year. Imagine the next population doubling and all that cost and suffering it will bring.
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Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
71–78 of 78 posts
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#72Earlier quoted context omitted.
That's not why, it's so that business signage is not blocked by foliage, and so that police can scan areas more quickly while on patrol.
That's an impressive level of carbrain. Roadside trees is completely standard all over the world, and Nukuʻalofa certainly has them: https://www.google.fr/maps/@-21.1406571,-175.2050866,3a,75y,... > it's so that business signage is not blocked by foliage That's patent nonsense ( https://www.google.fr/maps/@52.3653572,4.8753188,3a,75y,95.4... ) but even if it were not, why would it matter? Making the environment at la…
My comment was more about the interest groups that wield disproportionate decision making power at local levels. But have at it if you must.
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#73Earlier quoted context omitted.
Burning plastic/paper/other packaging gets you a lot of toxic stuff in the atmosphere. I know there are filters and processes and whatnot, but it just feels wrong and smelly. Aluminium recycling actually works great, recycled aluminium is 95% less energy expensive and some 75% of aluminium comes from recycling. (1) Steel could also be recycled like that, I guess ships are a lot more difficult to cut apart and melt do…
I see now. I misunderstood: I thought you were saying that dumping the remaining steel shells in the ocean was terrible for the ocean. Yeah, burning all that stuff is terrible.
I meant it in a more systemic way. Getting rid of waste is always worse then reducing ir reusing.
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#74Same solution as most problems: import tax should include cost of getting rid of the car when you’re done. Then getting rid of a car is free. Ship it off the island at your expense and you get a refund.
It's a nice idea, but as the article states:
>Located between Hawaii and New Zealand, over 3,000km east of Brisbane, Tonga's archipelago of islands is an expensive place to send a car.
>Once a vehicle gets here, it's used for a long time.
So basically you're making cars even more expensive, which will be an unpopular move with the locals, I assume.
I wonder if it would be possible to use old cars and other trash to reclaim land from the ocean?
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#75Earlier quoted context omitted.
To be fair (and balanced) Tonga does have a hot and humid ( tropical rainforest ) climate. The "cold" season means "it rarely gets over 27C (80F)", and humidity only dips a bit below 75% during the "dry" season.
Fair enough, but the solution cannot be cars. Its simple geometry. Cars do not scale in cities and small spaces. Enough brainstorming would give a cycle-friendly non-car solution to this. I don't know: sprinklers + shading + narrow streets (shading) etc. Car-centric cities only make cities hotter if anything.
Oh I completely agree, I’m sure there are a number of issues (salt, natural disasters, wealth) but it seems insane that a sunny, windy, tropical island 30 miles long would be reliant on ICE cars for anything but maybe emergency. I feel like that’s a complete personal and systemic failure.
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#76Earlier quoted context omitted.
Seems odd they don't use the same incoming ship to take cars back
Surely they don't have enough cars to return every time a shipment of new cars comes in. If that was economical, would the abandoned cars have piled up in the first place?
Assume they could at least do the 30,000 car backlog
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#77So many of the problems we've made seem like they could be great fixed by less people instead of more each year. Imagine the next population doubling and all that cost and suffering it will bring.
Technological progress have really doomed the planet. People living in huts and foraging for food are CO2 neutral. Meanwwhile nowadays utopia is a huge house, huge fridge, huge TV, gaming PC, tablet, phone, great exotic food, jetting to vacations. And of course everybody(*) planet-wide wants that, but there's just not enough resources/CO2 budget of the plante to cater for that...
(*) it's a generalization, yes people are different and not 100% of humans want this, please don't be boring and nitpick this word.
Re: Tonga is running out of space for more than 30k abandoned cars
#78Earlier quoted context omitted.
Isn't this the Mount Everest trash solution as well? You have to carry out more trash than you carried in
some call it decency to leave a place just a little bit better than the way they found it, but "Mount Everest trash solution" sounds nice too
If we trusted decency, we wouldn't have the Mount Everest trash problem in the first place...