The Netherlands vs Florida

[HysteryDiagnosis]

Eight Billion, that's the magic number... eight billion in the Netherlands to safeguard 10 million people and eight billion in the everglades to save Freddy the alligator. Go figure.



"On a cold winter night in 1953, the Netherlands suffered a terrifying blow as old dikes and seawalls gave way during a violent storm.

Flooding killed nearly 2,000 people and forced the evacuation of 70,000 others. Icy waters turned villages and farm districts into lakes dotted with dead cows.

Ultimately, the waters destroyed more than 4,000 buildings.

Afterward, the Dutch - realizing that the disaster could have been much worse, since half the country, including Amsterdam and Rotterdam, lies below sea level - vowed never again.

After all, as Tjalle de Haan, a Dutch public works official, put it in an interview last week, "Here, if something goes wrong, 10 million people can be threatened."

So at a cost of some $8 billion over a quarter century, the nation erected a futuristic system of coastal defenses that is admired around the world today as one of the best barriers against the sea's fury - one that could withstand the kind of storm that happens only once in 10,000 years."

Why are the Europeans so much more forward thinking about the inevtiable cyclical natural disasters than we in the United States are?

"The Dutch case is one of many in which low-lying cities and countries with long histories of flooding have turned science, technology and raw determination into ways of forestalling disaster.

[DemExpat]

1. My answer...

Why are the Europeans so much more forward thinking about the inevtiable cyclical natural disasters than we in the United States are?

The Netheralands is a tiny piece of land with centuries of culture and high population, so, for survival, they have had to address these problems.

They certainly have much knowledge to share now with other problem areas.

DemEx

[HysteryDiagnosis]

4. My hidden point is this..... if Florida, a state whose contracting

and money is controlled by the pResident's brother can get EIGHT BILLION dollars to "redo" the Everglades.... that's right, EIGHT BILLION dollars, much of which will be wasted, why is it that an area with over a million people can't get a fraction of that? It's cat tails (sp) vs people... oh and the everglades is not the hub of OUR DAMN ENERGY INDUSTRY.... so, again, the folly of man continues unabated.

[ebal]

7. Boston

The big dig was for 7.5 miles of road and cost 14.6 Billion, and leaks.

Maybe the LA senators don't have as much pull as Senator Kennedy, or in Florida as the President's brother.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

8. Welcome to DU, I appreciate what you stated.... "pull" goes a

long way.... even when it shouldn't.

[KG]

2. let's recall that the N.O. levee system was designed to withstand Cat. 3

hurricanr, not a Cat. 5, because to build one that would withstand a Cat 5 would 'cost too much'.

i'd be interested to know who was president when that decision was made.

[Koeln]

3. it´s a question of money

It is really impressiv to see the Polder system in the netherlands. They are the leading nation when it comes to build these kind of things. But htey did not finish the whole project because of environmental problems.

they build roads on these barriers and you can drive between the different islands and parts of the netherlands.
The cost of the dutch north sea is worth to visite

back on topic.
i saw an interview with a german aid worker who said they did not even have mobil pumps in new orleans. Such things are unbelivable in western Europe. But we also have problmes to fund our protection systems but not at this amount.

we europeans have a different mentality and a better but also bigger governmental system.
Pictures and scences as in new orleans are unbelivable and unimaginable in western Europe or it would lead to huge consequenses and changes.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

5. We're too busy blowing up countries that had nothing to do with

911 to be bothered with protecting our own people... so in effect, this tack has led to "the killing or our own people". There's more than one way to be an "evildoer". Being a moron in a high place is just as effective.

[Koeln]

9. there is a lot of truth

but i can hardly judge and understand the majortiy in the Us.

leaders like Bush with such a language and behaviour would not get elected in germany.
A war like iraq would not get support in germany.
Even the conservatives hate bush in my country. last week a leading conserative said that Bush needs to be shoot for his reaction in terms of katharina. after that he said he meant that Bush has to loose his job because of his failure. During the election campaign the conservative opposition leader refused to visite Bush because she feared the pictures and the negative reaction. it was the first time in decades that this happened.
Nobody would pay hundrets of billions in my country for such a war.

[Degtyarev]

6. indeed a good system

I live 22 meters above sea level but I am still quite proud at our little system.

It is indeed remarkable that once the dutch leaders were capable of making such wise decisions. I can assure you that today they would most surely fail.

The plans ("deltaplan") have been made when the Netherlands had a socialist prime minister (Drees); the best prime minister the dutch have EVER had.

That was the time when the dutch would not be stopped by a stupid little disaster and instead would be building up the country.

[fishnfla]

10. Whats your point?

I admit, I'm not real bright.

I thought the Everglades Restoration Plan was a Clinton/Gore project, implemented in 1996. Its a 30 year plan, 8 billion over that amount of time.
What does it have to do with hurricane levees? Its actually trying to undo decades of Corps of Engineer fuck ups, but it has nothing to do with hurricanes.
Its about restoring wetlands (*psst* in case you haven't heard, destruction of the coastal wetlands on the Miss Delta
made the storm damage worse)
Its about preserving the environment and restoring the proper flow of water to Florida Bay.
Who cares about taking care of the oil industry-let them pay their own way!

$200 billion is gonna be spent on NO and the Gulf coast. Miss leads the nation in corruption, Louisiana is third. I'd bet less than 1 bill of that will go for environmental restoration.

[Nay]

11. Thanks, fish, I was going to make this point myself.

As a native Floridian, I grew up with the knowledge that the Everglades was always in danger of being ruined, which would ruin Florida itself, basically. Developers were always encroaching on the land, mining and farming interests wanted to use the Everglades as a free sewer, etc., etc. I'm HAPPY that money is being spent to save the Everglades cuz, guess what? Florida will not be livable without it. No fresh water after you destroy the Everglades!

[HysteryDiagnosis]

12. My point is that the Everglades gets 8 billion and NO to this date

has received little or nothing.

My other point is that if you are interested in corruption, investigate the contracting done in S. Florida for this "restoration". See if MWI, Ingersoll Dresser Rand, and others aren't receiveing just about everything there is to receive.

My third point is that cattails were given more importance than the people of New Orleans and surrounding areas.

Furthermore, it's the groundwater you need to worry about in Florida for your fresh water supplies.... and the level of salt that has intruded into it.

http://fl.water.usgs.gov/Miami/online_reports/wri964285/
SUMMARY AND CONCLUSIONS

This map report depicts the approximate location of the saltwater interface in the Biscayne aquifer in 1995. The saltwater interface was defined through the evaluation of previously published maps of the interface, chloride data (both current and historical), and surface and borehole geophysical data. Sixteen wells were drilled to determine the location of the saltwater interface where additional data were needed. The location of the saltwater interface in 1995, compared to the location in 1984, was found to be approximately the same throughout much of Dade County, with most differences attributed to more information being available and not to any perceived movement of the saltwater interface. The canal system is the major factor influencing the movement of the saltwater interface throughout the county. Pumpage from the large well fields in central Dade County also influence the movement of the interface.

[enid602]

13. Houston

Also, much of Houston is below sea level, after years of pumping for drinking water, high-rise building, etc. Although inland, they are connected to the Gulf via Galveston Bay, and have suffered hurricanes in the past. MUCH larger population than NO, more refineries, chemical plants, etc., and they have NO defenses.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

14. Imagine how hard it must be to the be the biggest and baddest

on the block.... and have no defenses against "an act of God". Pretty humbling I imagine.

[Bryn]

15. I live 3 miles from the Everglades, Member of Friends of Everglades

I don't understand your point? Freddy the Alligator?? The Everglades *IS* Very Important.

Friends of the Everglades was started by Majory Stoneman Douglas who fought to save the Everglades. She wrote in 1947, The River of Grass: "There is no another one like it in the whole world." ... "Save the Everglades, you save the Planet."

www.everglades.org

Friends strives to protect and restore the Greater Kissimmee-Okeechobee-Everglades Ecosystem.Ê Our primary tools are legal advocacy and education.

In this site, you will find information on the Florida Everglades and on how you can help us all win the fight to protect one of the world's unique natural treasures.
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Stretching south from the vast 700 square mile Lake Okeechobee, nourished by the rain soaked Kissimmee River Basin, the Everglades is a wide slow moving river of marsh and sawgrass covering some 4,500 square miles, flowing quietly, peacefully, towards the mangrove estuaries of the Gulf of Mexico.
<snip>
<snip>
The Everglades was formed over thousands of years by this seasonal cycle of pulsing water. Fish, moving freely, flourishing in the vast wet summer marshes are herded into deeper pools as the water recedes in the dry season. Birds, alligators, raccoons, and other mammals gather to these pools to feed on fish and frogs and other reptiles. The shallowing water provides cover and food for the many colonies of nesting wading birds that have migrated from their northern enclaves - Wood storks, Herons, Sandhill Cranes, Great White Egrets and Ibis gather, feed and raise their young.

Thousands of species of plants, birds, animals, fish and reptiles make their home in the Everglades. That home is under siege. Fifty years of draining and diking, digging and building have destroyed over half of the historic Everglades. The remnants are in peril despite a much heralded 8 billion dollar restoration plan. Shortcuts are being taken and compromises are being made. Delay and apathy are becoming its enemies. The result is that none of the dozens of threatened and endangered species have, or are likely to, make any progress soon - or soon enough.

http://www.everglades.org/washingtonpost_com%20A%20Rescue%20Plan,%20Bold%20and%20Uncertain.htm

A Rescue Plan, Bold and Uncertain
Scientists, Federal Officials Question Project's Benefits for Ailing Ecosystem

By Michael Grunwald
Washington Post Staff Writer
Sunday, June 23, 2002; Page A01

First of four articles

President Bill Clinton and Gov. Jeb Bush met in the Oval Office on Dec. 11, 2000, to launch a $7.8 billion effort to revive the Florida Everglades. Vice President Al Gore, the plan's leading White House advocate, stayed home to watch CNN. That morning, the Supreme Court was hearing final arguments in the Florida vote-count case pitting him against Bush's brother George.

<snip>

But the Everglades is unique. That's why the national park, covering 40 percent of the remaining Everglades, was the first established for biology rather than scenery. That's why the United Nations designated it a World Heritage Site and an International Biosphere Reserve.

For a subtropical marsh, the Everglades is unusually flat, unusually wet and unusually low in nutrients. Those characteristics produced its singular biodiversity, from the algae mats at the bottom of its food chain to the storks, herons and other wading birds the 19th-century naturalist John James Audubon observed "in such numbers to actually block out the light of the sun." The park is the only place on Earth where alligators and crocodiles live side by side; President Bush has joked that Congress should study its example.

another link from www.everglades.org :

"Water quantity and quality flowing through the Everglades affect not only the wildlife and habitats of the protected natural Everglades, but also influence urban water supplies, flood protection, coastal estuaries, tourism, and even sport and commercial fisheries. The thousands of migratory birds who take up temporary residence in the Everglades come from as far away as Canada and South America. The State should have strengthened and to sped up protection for the endangered natural Everglades, simultaneously reducing the costs that all Florida citizens must now pay to continue to subsidize real estate speculators and the sugar industry."

[HysteryDiagnosis]

16. Now you are talking. I know the Everglades are important, and I

know what the digging of the canal system has done to them, I know what the pumping stations have done to them, I know what the sugar industry has done to them.... and it is good and right that they are trying to come up with a band-aid to fix them.

In my opinion, the best thing for the Everglades would be to fill in the canals, and evacuate Florida. That may be the only successful approach.

On the other hand, the scientists who honestly work towards coming up with a solution have as adversaries, the sugar industry, land speculators, commercial interests and PEOPLE. There simply are too many of them that have bought the great Florida lie.

My point is that while Florida is important for it's biodiversity and species that are in danger... NO is just as important, and little has been done to safeguard PEOPLE.

Joanie Mitchell said it best,

“They tore down Paradise and put up a parking lot.”

[Bryn]

17. 8 Billions Dollars is not going to Fix the Everglades

It will take 60 billions or more to fix the problem, but we are losing the battle. I fully support NO and I want likewise for the Everglades.

[HysteryDiagnosis]

18. If that is the case, and what you say is true.... then we will need

all of our military resources and hardware, and all of the money that is wasted on our Department of Offense and we will have to beat our swords into plowshares or we won't have a planet/country worth defending at any cost.

We have become the jar of flies.... and the lid doesn't come off this one.