If You Like The Milwaukee Road's Electrics......

Confidence? Apathy? 

I wonder the same about faultline communities, and (pardon me please) South Eastern beach houses.

I'm good with some mild risk of frostbite and a sore back.

Interesting film. Thanx for posting.

Adriatic posted:

Confidence? Apathy? 

I wonder the same about faultline communities, and (pardon me please) South Eastern beach houses.

I'm good with some mild risk of frostbite and a sore back.

I agree.  In grammar school, I learned how ancient Egyptians, living along the Nile River, farmed the fertile soil for most of the year.  Yet they didn't make the area their permanent residence.  Instead they lived on higher ground, away from the river, because each year, like clockwork, the river would flood.  

By no means is this a criticism of anyone living in areas prone to natural disasters.  It is, however, a statement on how, where and how densely we build. The dollar seems to dictate.  Katrina is the perfect example.  The Army Corp of Engineers knew of the weak links in the levies, yet we, our government, failed to spend the money to make the necessary corrections.

Al of that said, I am hijacking my own thread.....LOL 

Dan Padova posted:

  The camera is panning Coulee Dam.  Just below the dam is a nice little residential community.  Why would anyone build homes in a potentially dangerous, putting it mildly, place ?

In grammar school, I learned how ancient Egyptians, living along the Nile River, farmed the fertile soil for most of the year.  Yet they didn't make the area their permanent residence.  Instead they lived on higher ground, away from the river, because each year, like clockwork, the river would flood.  

By no means is this a criticism of anyone living in areas prone to natural disasters.  It is, however, a statement on how, where and how densely we build. The dollar seems to dictate.  Katrina is the perfect example.  The Army Corp of Engineers knew of the weak links in the levies, yet we, our government, failed to spend the money to make the necessary corrections.

Al of that said, I am hijacking my own thread.....LOL 

"In the course of my life I have had to eat my words, and I must confess it was a wholesome diet"..........Winston Churchill

Dan

You aren't hijacking anything.  However, you have set the table for a nice meal. 

Like the Nile of old, many rivers flood annually.  The Columbia River used to flood.  Those are natural disasters.

How many times has flooding happened in Coolee Dam, Washington in the last 80 years?

Zero!

One of the engineering Wonders of the World prevents natural disasters.

I believe you are concerned about a dam failure.  That would be a man made disaster.  It is an event that is extremely unlikely to occur in anyone's lifetime.  Grand Coolee is a gravity dam built atop bedrock.  It ties into bedrock at the abutments and contains nearly 12 million cubic yards of steel reinforced concrete.  Many people in that community work on the dam and have well informed opinions on the likelihood of a failure.  It is about as probable as an Egyptian being killed by a collapsing pyramid.

Oroville Dam is another story.  But that is a different type of dam.  And it is operated and maintained by the State of California. 

Unless a slow invasion of Californians leads to societal collapse in Washington living below Grand Coolie Dam is very, very safe.

Check back in a few thousand years. 

Thanks for adding the video.  The shots of the Puget Sound ferries are neat.  I especially liked the scenes of the Kalakala in Seattle and the Steel Electric in the San Juan islands.

Ted Hikel posted:

Dan Padova posted:

  The camera is panning Coulee Dam.  Just below the dam is a nice little residential community.  Why would anyone build homes in a potentially dangerous, putting it mildly, place ?

In grammar school, I learned how ancient Egyptians, living along the Nile River, farmed the fertile soil for most of the year.  Yet they didn't make the area their permanent residence.  Instead they lived on higher ground, away from the river, because each year, like clockwork, the river would flood.  

By no means is this a criticism of anyone living in areas prone to natural disasters.  It is, however, a statement on how, where and how densely we build. The dollar seems to dictate.  Katrina is the perfect example.  The Army Corp of Engineers knew of the weak links in the levies, yet we, our government, failed to spend the money to make the necessary corrections.

Al of that said, I am hijacking my own thread.....LOL 

"In the course of my life I have had to eat my words, and I must confess it was a wholesome diet"..........Winston Churchill

Dan

You aren't hijacking anything.  However, you have set the table for a nice meal. 

Like the Nile of old, many rivers flood annually.  The Columbia River used to flood.  Those are natural disasters.

How many times has flooding happened in Coolee Dam, Washington in the last 80 years?

Zero!

One of the engineering Wonders of the World prevents natural disasters.

I believe you are concerned about a dam failure.  That would be a man made disaster.  It is an event that is extremely unlikely to occur in anyone's lifetime.  Grand Coolee is a gravity dam built atop bedrock.  It ties into bedrock at the abutments and contains nearly 12 million cubic yards of steel reinforced concrete.  Many people in that community work on the dam and have well informed opinions on the likelihood of a failure.  It is about as probable as an Egyptian being killed by a collapsing pyramid.

Oroville Dam is another story.  But that is a different type of dam.  And it is operated and maintained by the State of California. 

Unless a slow invasion of Californians leads to societal collapse in Washington living below Grand Coolie Dam is very, very safe.

Check back in a few thousand years. 

Thanks for adding the video.  The shots of the Puget Sound ferries are neat.  I especially liked the scenes of the Kalakala in Seattle and the Steel Electric in the San Juan islands.

And what a meal it could be !   You are correct, my concern is with a dam failure.  Let's look at it from another point of view.  Suppose we never built any dams but allowed rivers to flow and flood naturally ?   We could emulate the Egyptians, still having industry near the river.  It would have to have been designed to allow for the yearly floods.  That, in and of itself is the sticking point, the way I see it.  The cost would have been prohibitive and the "Men Who Built America" would not have wanted to spend neither the time or money to build such infrastructure around nature.  Instead we force nature to work around us.  In the end nature always wins.  We've seen many times where dams built that were not engineered properly, fail and take many lives and much property with them.  

In an ideal world, we would have designed our lives around nature, not the other way round.  But it isn't an ideal world so we will pay in the end.

Thank you for your optimism thinking we'll be around in a few thousand years.  Not sure if thats a good or bad thing.

Let's look at it from another point of view.  Suppose we never built any dams but allowed rivers to flow and flood naturally ?

OK, let's suppose that.  So there would have been no power from Grand Coulee and Bonneville Dams 75 years ago to smelt aluminum in the pacific northwest for Boeing to build B-17s and B-29s or the first 707s 60 years ago.  40 years ago there would have been less power for a little start-up called Microsoft.

In addition to trainloads of tree fruit, most of the US supply of mint comes from land irrigated with Columbia river water.  If you ever chew gum or have a piece of candy you can be thankful that a few visionaries proposed building a dam at Grand Coulee a century ago.

And today I wouldn't have the electrons with which to type this message without burning coal or oil.

I'll take Grand Coulee!

Thank you for your optimism thinking we'll be around in a few thousand years.  Not sure if thats a good or bad thing.

The threat of a man made disaster becomes higher as more and more people become uncertain if the continued existence of mankind is very good or not.  I'd like the people maintaining our dams to be proud of what they do and have a high regard for the people for whom they do it.

Besides, I don't think the Milwaukee Pacific extension, electrification, Super Domes or Skytop Lounges were built by pessimists.

Adriatic posted:

I wonder the same about faultline communities

The problem there is that the US is riddled with fault lines. If people were to avoid places where natural disasters could happen, nobody would live within a couple of miles of any coast line, and nowhere on the West coast or around the center of the country (as one of the most intense series earthquakes in US history was in the state of Missouri).

That's just not realistic.

I grew up in Tallahassee, Florida. A few hurricanes hit the area in the 20th century (and two in the last two years), but in the 28 years I lived there, only one hit the town, and there hadn't been one for many years before that. Statistically, weather doesn't hit the area very hard. So, people take the risk.

You have a chance for nature to mess you up almost anywhere you live. Yes, some people are practically asking for it (there is a river bank near where I grew up, at the base of a dam, that'd flood at least 2-3 times every year and every time, people were flooded out and crying to the TV cameras that it was horrible, even though it kept happening to them), but if you live long enough, you're likely to see something happen to you.

I live in an area that has the potential for a massive earthquake someday. The last happened in the 18th century and happens every few centuries or so and apparently nobody realized this until within my own lifetime. So now, we are bombarded with "It's going to happen any day now!" messages from people who apparently don't realize you can't predict earthquakes and none happen on a schedule. Is it a risk? Yeah, but it could be decades or centuries until it happens again. In a similar timeframe, natural disasters will hit other places numerous times, statistically.

Heck, how many people thought that there'd be a major earthquake in Virginia that damaged stuff in Washington DC, for crying out loud? Should everyone move away from that region of the country, knowing it could happen again someday?

Well, if we are going to make it another thousand years, we will have to dream up an economic system that does not depend on continuous growth.

p51 posted:

Adriatic posted:

I wonder the same about faultline communities

<snip>I live in an area that has the potential for a massive earthquake someday. The last happened in the 18th century and happens every few centuries or so and apparently nobody realized this until within my own lifetime. So now, we are bombarded with "It's going to happen any day now!" messages from people who apparently don't realize you can't predict earthquakes and none happen on a schedule.

Is that near the area that's supposed to get buried in mud the next time Mt Rainier decides to lose some weight?

---PCJ

RailRide posted:

p51 posted:

<snip>I live in an area that has the potential for a massive earthquake someday. The last happened in the 18th century and happens every few centuries or so and apparently nobody realized this until within my own lifetime. So now, we are bombarded with "It's going to happen any day now!" messages from people who apparently don't realize you can't predict earthquakes and none happen on a schedule.

Is that near the area that's supposed to get buried in mud the next time Mt Rainier decides to lose some weight?

Yes, an event which might not happen for thousands (or maybe even tens of thousands) of years. You don't suggest everyone evacuate the entire Pacific Northwest over a threat that people would see coming from a long way off (go look at how long people were warned before Mt St Helens blew in 1980, long before we have the technology to monitor such events now)?

I highly recommend evacuating Southern California.  Take your cars with you.  Leave your daughters.