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Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

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Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#101

Post by dredmorbius »

danielweber wrote: post #47
japhyr wrote: post #4

A gondola ride to the bottom of the Grand Canyon would be like a gondola ride to the top of Everest. These projects are deeply frustrating because all the developers have to do is get them built once - they can essentially fail as many times as they need to in order to get their project built. If you oppose this kind of project, you have to succeed in your efforts over and over again. If you fail once, the wild natur…

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

Garrett Hardin -- he of the Tragedy of the Commons -- addressed the question of disabled access to wilderness. He opposed it.

Hardin suffered from polio, contracted before WWII, and walked using braces and crutches for the rest of his life.

While I cannot find an online reference to that view, it's one he visited multiple times in his essays, collected in several books: http://www.powells.com/s?kw=garrett+hardin&class=

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#102

Post by dredmorbius »

elif wrote: post #98
danielweber wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

Think about the most beautiful, breathtaking beach or vista you've been to. I'm talking blow-your-mind, stop you in your tracks to contemplate the natural world caliber of beautiful. Maybe you've never had that experience, but if you have, how long did it take you to get there? how many people were around? My point is, the beauty of these places is in many cases derived specifically from their remoteness. Their inacc…

"A bad road is a good filter."

One of my own favorite sites, long reachable only by a long and often difficult to traverse dirt road, had a paved road put in some years ago. And while there were some environmental arguments in favor (the dust from vehicles washed into local creeks and affected aquatic life), it hugely changed the nature of the destination at the end of the road.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#103

Post by donpark »

If Escalade has to be built, they should build it entirely underground with just a handful of few holes at the top and a couple at the bottom. Each room gets its own fixed camera projecting outside view to the room as well as remotely controlled camera drones for lazy visitors.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#104

Post by dredmorbius »

codyb wrote: post #13
sp332 wrote: post #10

Earlier quoted context omitted.

A gondola ride to the top of Everest would be awesome. Right now, 1.4% of the people who try to summit it die. That's ludicrous and totally indefensible. Anyway it's not as wild as it used to be. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Mount_Everest#Everest_economy

A gondola ride to Everest would be awful. A quick ascent to that height would virtually guarantee some pretty awful side effects for most passengers. I certainly wouldn't want to be on it.

That's a problem already for passengers on China's Qinghai-Tibet railway line, whose highest station is above 5,000m (16,600 feet).

The railroad cars offer enriched oxygen and supplemental oxygen, though they're not pressurized. Edema is a real possibility.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Qinghai%E2%80%93Tibet_Railway

Or this travelog:

http://www.sfgate.com/travel/article/HIGH-TRAIN-TO-TIBET-Wor...

As the altimeter approaches 17,000 feet, a package of potato chips balloons outward until it ruptures a seam. Sunscreen and hand sanitizer erupt unbidden from bottles. In soft sleeper class, Chinese businessmen sprawl listlessly on their bunks, sucking oxygen from plastic hoses. The bathrooms smell of vomit.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#105

Post by lambeosaurus »

danielweber wrote: post #47
japhyr wrote: post #4

A gondola ride to the bottom of the Grand Canyon would be like a gondola ride to the top of Everest. These projects are deeply frustrating because all the developers have to do is get them built once - they can essentially fail as many times as they need to in order to get their project built. If you oppose this kind of project, you have to succeed in your efforts over and over again. If you fail once, the wild natur…

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

> They exist so that people can enjoy them

No. They exist because they exist. It's a privilege that we get to appreciate them.

We can't seem to lose the notion that the universe was created for us.

When the earth is a barren ball of rock and humanity is long-gone, maybe someone out there will notice the irony in it all.

> I met a traveller from an antique land Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone Stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown, And wrinkled lip, and sneer of cold command, Tell that its sculptor well those passions read Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things, The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed: And on the pedestal these words appear: 'My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: Look on my works, ye Mighty, and despair!' Nothing beside remains. Round the decay Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare The lone and level sands stretch far away."

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#106

Post by sliverstorm »

danielweber wrote: post #47
japhyr wrote: post #4

A gondola ride to the bottom of the Grand Canyon would be like a gondola ride to the top of Everest. These projects are deeply frustrating because all the developers have to do is get them built once - they can essentially fail as many times as they need to in order to get their project built. If you oppose this kind of project, you have to succeed in your efforts over and over again. If you fail once, the wild natur…

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

These parks don't just exist in a vacuum. They exist so that people can enjoy them.

... Enjoy them in certain ways, that preserve their nature as much as possible. Think about designated wilderness areas, for example. How do you run an asphalt sidewalk through a designated wilderness area, where rangers must use hand-saws instead of chainsaws? Can it still be wilderness if you do?

“A wilderness, in contrast with those areas where man and his own works dominate the landscape, is hereby recognized as an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man, where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#107

Post by sstrudeau »

unreal37 wrote: post #53
danielweber wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

I see the point you're making. I've been to the Grand Canyon, and it's difficult to get to. Even off the main road, it's 30 slow miles over unpaved dusty, bumpy road to get to the Western rim. If night falls, you're in tough shape because the road is unlit. If you are low on gas, or need a break, there's no place to stop. Even in 2015, the canyon is hard to get to. But to turn it into a mini-Las Vegas would be a crim…

The example of exactly this happening at Niagara Falls was part of the impetus for the National Park System in the first place.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#108

Post by pmcg »

elif wrote: post #98
danielweber wrote: post #47

Earlier quoted context omitted.

In high school, every Monday my geology teacher Mr. Weinle would show slides from a national park he visited. One of them -- I don't remember which -- had an asphalt sidewalk running through it. He said "I was mad as hell when I saw this. This is nature! You should protect it!" Then he switched slides to the next picture he took: it showed a man with leg braces walking through the park. He held up his fingers and sai…

Think about the most beautiful, breathtaking beach or vista you've been to. I'm talking blow-your-mind, stop you in your tracks to contemplate the natural world caliber of beautiful. Maybe you've never had that experience, but if you have, how long did it take you to get there? how many people were around? My point is, the beauty of these places is in many cases derived specifically from their remoteness. Their inacc…

Some places are really beautiful, but would not be less beautiful just because people can enjoy them.

Maybe the solution is to preserve these places until we have relatively cheap tech (like quadcopter drones) that can carry people to some of these places. Allow them to come in only at certain times or whatever so normally the place is still as wild as ever. Or VR connected to drones that people can fly around... there are many possibilities in the not-too-distant future that probably.

But right now the only practical way to make these places accessible is with paved roads so that's what happens.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#109

Post by vacri »

gnaritas wrote: post #76
Fede_V wrote: post #26

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's because those people have no business being there. Those mountains are for genuine climbers that can earn their ascent there, not idiots with too much money and no respect for a mountain, who have sherpas basically push them to the top. I hate this ridiculously entitled attitude. If you aren't a great climber in fantastic physical shape, just don't go to Everest. I have the same kind of contempt for people who…

> That's because those people have no business being there. Says who? Who are you to tell people where they have business being? > Those mountains are for genuine climbers that can earn their ascent there, not idiots with too much money and no respect for a mountain, who have sherpas basically push them to the top. Again, says who? > I hate this ridiculously entitled attitude. Like the one you're showing telling othe…

Says who?

Biology. Dying from a cerebral oedema is one way your body tells you "you shouldn't have come here". Rushing quickly up that kind of altitude is dangerous to your health - for example, one of the biggest contributors to altitude medicine was when India rushed an army to the Himalayas in the '60s to counter China [1]. They got a lot of pulmonary and cerebral oedemas, and the sizable affected population really helped the literature in the topic.

Also, keep in mind that the opinion offered was in response to someone basically saying that it was indefensible to not build a gondola ride to the top of everest. I notice you didn't tell that commenter "says who?".

[1] http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Sino-Indian_War

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#110

Post by vacri »

raldi wrote: post #67
mcguire wrote: post #64

Earlier quoted context omitted.

The point of accessibility is to allow proportion of humanity to live normally , to do the same things that most of the rest can do; i.e. work, see a movie, and yes, take in a view. The reason to do that is that it improves the lives of the smaller proportion while at least not injuring the rest. (You believe only having stairs in a tall building would be a feature ?) Are you willing to make the argument that looking…

> Are you willing to make the argument that looking out from the top of Everest or tramming to the bottom of the canyon for an afternoon is something that everyone should be able to do? Yes, absolutely. Why shouldn't humanity aspire to that? > Grand Canyon development also has costs which would reduce the value of the site. Are those costs worth the benefits? My point of view is that yes, the benefits do indeed outwe…

Doesn't seem very aspirational to me. The glory in Everest isn't the nice view, but the feat it takes to get there. When people talk about Everest stories, the view doesn't feature very strongly.
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