UNESCO Says Venice Should Be Added To Heritage Danger List (washingtonpost.com) 50
The United Nations' cultural protection agency, UNESCO, plans to recommend adding Venice to its list of World Heritage sites in danger, as the iconic island city faces simultaneous threats from climate change, mass tourism and rapid urban development. From a report: The designation, meant to encourage remedial actions and marshal international support for World Heritage sites, is recommended in a UNESCO report published Monday ahead of its World Heritage Committee meeting in September. The List of World Heritage in Danger identifies dozens of sites that are "threatened by serious and specific dangers," such as armed conflict or natural disasters. It includes Odessa in Ukraine, which was added in January because of war-related threats, and the Everglades in Florida, which faces environmental degradation.
The proposal by UNESCO is the latest alarm bell over the future of Venice -- one of the world's most fragile and popular cities -- as well as the Italian government's efforts to protect it. Built across 118 small islands, the city was first designated as a World Heritage site in 1987 for its architectural splendor and work of master artists including Giorgione and Titian, among others. "It is tragic that the state of conservation of one of the most treasured cultural sites in the world is of such concern" that experts are considering Venice for the "in danger" list, Helene Marsh, a professor of environmental science at Australia's James Cook University who has researched climate change and World Heritage sites, said in an email. A warming world poses an "existential threat" to preservation and conservation, Marsh said.
The proposal by UNESCO is the latest alarm bell over the future of Venice -- one of the world's most fragile and popular cities -- as well as the Italian government's efforts to protect it. Built across 118 small islands, the city was first designated as a World Heritage site in 1987 for its architectural splendor and work of master artists including Giorgione and Titian, among others. "It is tragic that the state of conservation of one of the most treasured cultural sites in the world is of such concern" that experts are considering Venice for the "in danger" list, Helene Marsh, a professor of environmental science at Australia's James Cook University who has researched climate change and World Heritage sites, said in an email. A warming world poses an "existential threat" to preservation and conservation, Marsh said.
Not Suprising (Score:2)
Re:Not Suprising (Score:4, Insightful)
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My name is Krampus, and I am going to crawl under the floor, slit your throat while you sleep, and make the Mediterranean rise by two meters in mere hours!
That's not how Krampus works. If you're going to claim to be an elder monster? You gotta research the lore first, man. Haven't you watched Supernatural? Freakin' amateur hour over here.
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Claiming to know about elder beings while citing Supernatural as your source material is not it.
I went a little meta there. Supernatural teaches us to always research first. Research Krampus. That was the point.
Re:Not Suprising (Score:5, Insightful)
Now, now, stop getting your panties in a twist over climate change. Want to see it? Check out the wave heights on the U.S. West Coast. They've been increasing, a lot, enough to start causing a lot of erosion.
Or, you can go check in with the fishies in the N. Atlantic. The fishermen are whining they must travel farther north to chase them and that costs money.
Or you can check with ocean temperatures off Florida, last I heard they were 100 degrees F.
Or you can continue to stick your head up your butt and yell it is all a scam....by thousands of scientists the world over. Some how they've managed to keep their conspiracy going even though you see it where your head has been.
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It's always one conspiracy theory after another with you people
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but nobody cares
Literally everyone involved in the management of these sites cares. They care deeply about the designation. That one random anonymous idiot on the internet doesn't is what is irrelevant here.
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But have they explained the red tape that everyone in Venice will have to start wading through (pun intended) to make any changes to their homes and businesses?
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Compared to subsidence, sea level is completely irrelevant.
https://psmsl.org/data/obtaini... [psmsl.org]
As always, tidal gauges are the best weapon against sea level rise.
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Errr...did you actually learn how to read graphs?
Anyhow, here's a more uptodate graph:
http://www.ioc-sealevelmonitor... [ioc-sealev...toring.org]
Seems like sea level is rising everywhere. Subsidence only happen in some localities mainly due to local geologic conditions.
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Errr...did you actually learn how to read graphs?
Have you actually learned how to read?
The story is specifically about Venice. Which is only of those localities that is experiencing subsidence. Having read about Venice, it's because the wood posts most of the city was built on are sinking deeper into the silt on the sea floor in that location.
Your updated graph basically shows that they've gone from 7000 mm to 7200mm. Not significantly different than Pinky's chart. We're looking at 20cm of rise over the last ~100 years or so.
But some googling suggests
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So in that context, now discuss how to address these problems. Because "pointing fingers" doesn't solve anything.
The unfortunate truth is that humanity LOVES to spend more energy on pointing fingers, assigning blame, than on finding solutions. It keeps us divided and makes us easier to manipulate by people that have the money and/or power to address large groups at the same time. And we let them, because the vast majority of us are easily swayed by the media.
If we spent half the effort we spend tearing each other down on finding solutions to our common problems, the problems that either do or will affect all of humani
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Ah, the Olde It's Been Hotter in the Past argument. Yes. However average temperature changes in the past happened over a fairly long period of time. For us, it is happening within one generation.
Let me introduce you Newton and the calculus. You seem to have missed the memo. You see, the RATE of change matters.
Regardless of how it is happening now, it does mean much less arable land for people to live off. Guess where they're going to migrate to? You have room where you live, yes?
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(face-palm). Please separate politics from issues.
The climate has changed for the entire life of the planet. Whether it's human caused or not is immaterial and just makes everybody upset. The world has been MUCH hotter than it is now, and MUCH cooler than it is now.
This argument is extremely problematic in that it has a kernel of truth, and then extrapolates an illogical conclusion. Spock would be very upset at it. Here's why:
While the planet has been much hotter than now, and much cooler, those geologic ages (dubbed Ice Ages and Tropical Ages) happen over very, very long periods of time -- transitions that take tens and hundreds of thousands of years to occur. When the planet is seeing changes that historically took thousands of years occur in just a few years,
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The bigger immediate problem is that Venice is sinking even without any sea level rise.
Re: Not Suprising (Score:2)
The ultimate solution is actually pretty straightforward, even if it would make Venice somewhat less "authentic": over the course of a decade or so, temporarily block and drain its canals. Jack the buildings up a few feet, replace the old wood-piling foundations with concrete 2-3 feet higher, re-fill the canals, and move on to the next section. Maybe even excavate out a cut & cover subway under one of the canals, and lay a proper modern sewage system. Problem solved.
Before someone brings up areas like S
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Re: Not Suprising (Score:2)
I was specifically using St. Mark's plaza ("Piazza San Marco" in Italian?) add an example of a public, historically sensitive area built at ground level on an island that floods frequently... and used Abu Simbel to illustrate the accomplishment of a seemingly-impossible preservation task achieved via modern engineering.
On the 0.1% chance you've never heard of Abu Simbel, there was a tomb carved into the base of a hill, and statues carved into the face of the hill. In the late 1960s, they literally sliced th
Amoral familialism (Score:5, Insightful)
This can be blamed on 'amoral familialism' -- a familiar concept in Italy (read Robert Putnam's Making Democracy Work), countless people not either caring about climate change or believing it is a real scientific fact. The result is our children are likely to inherit a world that lacks many of the things we enjoyed, and may well be far more challenging to inhabit.
Quick question (Score:2, Insightful)
This can be blamed on 'amoral familialism' -- a familiar concept in Italy (read Robert Putnam's Making Democracy Work), countless people not either caring about climate change or believing it is a real scientific fact. The result is our children are likely to inherit a world that lacks many of the things we enjoyed, and may well be far more challenging to inhabit.
Quick question: How much of Venice's problems are caused by climate change, and how much are caused by the sinking landscape?
I only ask because I had read that Venice was formed from buildings built on land that gradually sinks, albeit slowly, over the centuries.
For an analogy, are wildfires caused by climate change, or by decades of poor forest management and arson?
Before you assign your explanation as the cause, you need to discount other, competing hypotheses.
Re:Quick question (Score:5, Interesting)
Both.
And the problems are multiplicative, not merely additive.
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And the problems are multiplicative, not merely additive.
What does that mean?
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Both.
And the problems are multiplicative, not merely additive.
In Venice's case the problem is literally additive. Sea level rising + buildings sinking. Sea levels rising do not cause buildings to sink faster relative to their starting point. The wildfire issue is additive, since fires cause more carbon release which causes a positive feedback loop. Venice's problem does not.
Re:Quick question (Score:5, Insightful)
Quick question: How much of Venice's problems are caused by climate change, and how much are caused by the sinking landscape?
I only ask because I had read that Venice was formed from buildings built on land that gradually sinks, albeit slowly, over the centuries.
For an analogy, are wildfires caused by climate change, or by decades of poor forest management and arson?
Before you assign your explanation as the cause, you need to discount other, competing hypotheses.
A classic "Look over here! There may be another cause!" diversion from climate change, when it's patently obvious climate change is the primary driver of issues (amplified by other factors like in Venice case, the sinking and pumping of groundwater). The example of wildfires you cite is one of the simplest to refute because of robust geological evidence.
Wildfires, at least the ones here in California, have not been as significant in thousands of years: https://www.lemonde.fr/en/envi... [lemonde.fr]
Poor forest management (such as a certain president's insistence that California "rake its forests," which the largest are actually under Federal jurisdiction) in a largely wild, unspoiled land cannot explain the start of fires unprecedented in magnitude for millenia; especially since they start in "wilderness" areas requiring a special permit to enter and not often frequented by humans. Therefore, "poor forest management" cannot be seen as a valid "competing hypothesis," but rather a silly misdirection that completely fails to explain the core problem.
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Just look at average rainfall in the American West. Lemme guess, it stopped raining because people weren't managing rain properly. Dingbat.
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Yeah, but think of the video games they'll have. Full VR with characters who can use AI to respond appropriately to any situation.
I mean, seriously, fuck Venice, I want *that*.
Does that mean anything actually material? (Score:1)
Otherwise it's about as useful as the scale in my bathroom. Scary in the abstract, but otherwise not impacting my behaviour...
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[rubs eyes, cleans glasses] Oh... Venice. (Score:2)
UNESCO Says Venice Should Be Added To Heritage Danger List
At first glance I thought it said "Science" not "Venice" -- and thinking about it now, I'm okay with either.
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Fuck off MacTroll
Foolish (Score:2)
It's foolish to think that Venice as it's been known can be saved, for centuries it's been subjected to flooding from storms and the normal tides. There are old films and newsreels showing flooding and devastation in Venice going back decades a lot of the buildings still have high water marks indicated on them from past flooding events. Go to the museums in Venice and you can see the platform shoes worn well through the 19th century so citizens didn't get their feet wet. Hell, a good storm or earthquake wo
They forgot something (Score:2)
https://lifeinitaly.com/venice... [lifeinitaly.com] It is sinking an average of a millimeter a year. So if we are going to be realistic about preserving Venice, we need to rebuild the entire city with new pilings that are a lot higher.
But then that would destroy the charm of the floating city. In reality, it is a failed place in the long term. An experiment that was destined to fail even
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Venice was less a failed experiment and more a successful attempt to build in a place that's hard for raiders and warriors to attack and pillage.
If Venice is Sinking (Score:2)
Danger? lol (Score:1)