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Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

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Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#91

Post by cgh »

japhyr wrote: post #84
cgh wrote: post #63

Earlier quoted context omitted.

We fought a similar gondola project in my town and won. Developers wanted to build a gondola to the top of the Stawamus Chief, a big granite monolith on the edge of town. It got shot down. The fact that it's a provincial park probably helped. The gondola got built in a more suitable location, to the top of a nearby ridge, and now everyone is happy. Hopefully the people organising against this Grand Canyon silliness s…

Thank you for doing that. I hope to climb the Chief some day, and I'll be happy not to top out in front of a gondola depot.

Well, I'd like to take some real credit, but all I did was sign a petition and mutter darkly. There was a lot of opposition and I guess every name made a difference.

As far as climbing the Chief goes, get up here, you aren't getting any younger. A bunch of great new routes have gone up over the last few years, including some stellar moderates:

http://squamishclimbingsource.com/sunset-strip/

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#92

Post by Theodores »

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…

I rode by bicycle to the South Rim, put my bike on the roof rack of some tour bus, walked down to the bottom, up the other side and got back on my bicycle again, to keep going up through Utah.

I have done a lot more riding in Wales where we have Mt Snowdon, complete with a railway to the top. Furthermore, there is a cafe there, 'blighting' the highest point in Wales (and England).

However...

The railway is cute because it was old. Aeons ago that was shocking new machinery and there must have been those that feared the wilderness being lost. This new-fangled gondola will also gain pedigree and heritage over time, to garner a worthy history of its own.

The tourist tailored top doesn't spoil the mountain for me and I am glad that there is one 'must see' mountain that is accessible to all. The truth is that the 'must see' mountain makes the others second rate when it comes to height. This means they are all relatively devoid of tourists.

So consider the gondola going to the deepest part, the prime spot and totally letting the car-bound tourists having it. They won't need to stray too far and it could work wonders for depleting the general area of tourists. Which is good for those that can be bothered to get their without the aid of a motor.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#93

Post by snowwrestler »

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…

There are asphalt trails in some side canyons of Yosemite Valley. They are asphalt because the trails are so heavily used that any normally constructed trail would require frequent significant (expensive) maintenance. Asphalt was the least worst option.

But why do the trails get so much usage? Because Yosemite Valley has experienced heavy development, which allows a ton of people to stay there at one time.

The actual mission of the National Park Service, according to the bill that created it, is:

> to conserve the scenery and the natural and historic objects and the wild life therein and to provide for the enjoyment of the same in such manner and by such means as will leave them unimpaired for the enjoyment of future generations.

It's the last part where people get mad at the NPS. One cannot look at a picture of Yosemite Valley as it originally existed, and the mess it is today, and think that it's "unimpaired."

Likewise, I don't see how anyone can look at what is proposed for the Grand Canyon and say it would leave the GC unimpaired.

What makes natural experiences so valuable is that they are not shaped to the conveniences of human beings. National parks are not just about pretty scenery. They are about preserving an experience that once was common, but is almost gone.

There is no way to improve access to that experience without also harming it. And once it is gone, it's gone forever. We have no idea how to create natural experiences. All we can possibly do is protect the few we haven't already wrecked.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#94

Post by snowwrestler »

raldi wrote: post #42
pmjordan wrote: post #31

Earlier quoted context omitted.

Yes, the Great wall of China, that strange natural phenomenon, formed by tectonic forces over millions of years.

Why is that relevant? Would the Grand Canyon be less grand if it was only a couple millennia old?

There is a qualitative difference between a natural experience and a man-made experience. It's not about the age, although natural landscapes are obviously old. It's about experiencing the forces that shaped the landscape, in their original form.

Natural landscapes are valuable because they don't care about people; they make people small again. You can't adapt that to human convenience, and protect it, at the same time.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#95

Post by snowwrestler »

npongratz wrote: post #18
codyb wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Millions of people ascend to the height of Everest's summit every day, extremely quickly. I imagine that such a purpose-built gondola would, like modern jets, have a pressurized cabin.

So why do we need the gondola at all? If people just want to hit 29,035 feet above sea level, they can take a plane anywhere in the world.

What makes the top of Everest interesting to visit is that to do it, a person has to overcome very difficult natural challenges. So a gondola to the top would destroy the very value it was supposed to provide.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#96

Post by [deleted] »

npongratz wrote: post #18
codyb wrote: post #13

Earlier quoted context omitted.

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.

Millions of people ascend to the height of Everest's summit every day, extremely quickly. I imagine that such a purpose-built gondola would, like modern jets, have a pressurized cabin.

[deleted]

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#97

Post by smm2000 »

mc32 wrote: post #33
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

There are two problems with that. One is that for previous and future traditional ascenders it would "cheapen" the experience. In essence it makes scaling it mundane, so you would have elitists oppose this. The second is that unless you institute a limited lottery system Everest would become littered like mt Fujiyama. So basically nature becomes spoiled by commercial interests. So given those choices, what's the answ…

That gandola won't be cheap to build. Better solution is to auction spots or set price high enough that only limited number of people can afford it.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#98

Post by elif »

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…

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 inaccessibility is precisely the nucleus of what makes them what they are.

Sure it's absolutely unfair that disabled persons won't have that experience without far more effort, if at all.

But is the solution really to make it such that no one can?

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#99

Post by amalcon »

Theodores wrote: post #92
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…

I rode by bicycle to the South Rim, put my bike on the roof rack of some tour bus, walked down to the bottom, up the other side and got back on my bicycle again, to keep going up through Utah. I have done a lot more riding in Wales where we have Mt Snowdon, complete with a railway to the top. Furthermore, there is a cafe there, 'blighting' the highest point in Wales (and England). However... The railway is cute becau…

I was thinking the same thing. Mount Washington sounds very similar. It's the highest peak in the northeastern United States, and part of the famous Appalachian Trail. It also has both an auto road and an old-style mountain climbing railway, with some touristy stuff at the top.

Hikers don't seem to mind this very much -- in fact, it's common for even fairly experienced hikers to ascend in the morning and take a bus down later, so that they may spend more time at the summit. There are several somewhat lower (but still spectacular) peaks in the same range, which are largely untouched.

Re: Who Can Save the Grand Canyon?

#100

Post by libria »

Fede_V wrote: post #43
nsxwolf wrote: post #35

Earlier quoted context omitted.

That's mountain climbing elitism. The "great climbers" made it look cool, then others with more money than skill figured out their own way to do it, and had a great time to boot. I'm sure that drives elitists nuts, kind of like how I'm sure software hackers building with Arduino makes EE majors nuts.

A better analogy would be if an software hacker paid for several starving EE students to come build an amazing Arduino project for their child's science fair, then bragged to everyone about how smart their child is. Alternatively, imagine Larry Ellison paying for a shitload of comp-sci PhD students to comb through The Art of Programming to look for mistakes, only to submit them under his name so he could get his own…

Your examples illustrate someone lying. Merely arriving at the summit of Everest by assisted means does not make one a liar. People do many things - summiting among them - for their own amusement, not to make grandiose claims. Jon Krakauer "bought" (or had it purchased on his behalf) his way to the top of Everest and to my knowledge has not equated himself with Sir Edmund Hillary to date.

If teleportation was invented, would it cheapen the pioneer's accomplishments if we could just buy a ticket to teleport to the top, grab a peek, and teleport home?

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