Comments by Carl May
October 18, 2006
Checking in again. I see all are still avoiding learning the basic interacting conditions and forces involved in sandy beach dynamics. Of course it's stupid to build on a retreating bluff, and anyone who would sell a geologically ignorant person such a piece of property with any expectation of permanence is irresponsible. Of course bluff armoring redirects erosive forces and deprives the beach of one of its sources of sand. Of course waves that reach bluffs erode them. But do you know that a big…
October 16, 2006
Just checking in. Still no awareness of the dynamic geologic basics of the origins of beach sand and the relationship of that sand to all the conditions and forces influencing the beach to make it what it is.
Carl May
October 12, 2006
Dear folks, Some of you are still avoiding a basic self-education on beaches, bluffs, and sand. What is going on at the beach in question (which, as a biologist by education, I have been visiting since I moved here in 1974 as part of perambulations in the marine reserve) is not what would be going on without the armoring of the bluffs and other artificial influences (some of which I alluded to in the questions I previously posted as ones that people could have in mind as they pursued the understanding…
October 10, 2006
Please, folks, just learn the geologic basics of sandy beaches. There's a world of easy understanding out there to be tapped into and end your flailing at local subject matter. It's only partly book an school learning. What drives it home is what you can see, verify, and figure out for yourself once you have an idea what is going on with physical conditions and forces. My amazement concerns how little long-time local residents bother to learn about the area in which they live, how little they observe,…
October 10, 2006
The lack of an awareness of even basic geology for our area always amazes me. The lack of awareness of the negative effects of some kinds of development and other artificial activity in light of well-known geological factors compounds my amazement. Sandy beaches are dynamic areas, in constant change due to a variety of interacting physical conditions and forces. It does not take years of technical education to get the basics distilled for us by coastal geologists. What are the kinds of beaches? On…
October 05, 2006
The long history of rip-rap on the California coast is that it damages both bluffs and beach. Where rip-rap and other shoreline armoring go in, beach is lost--sometimes entirely. Where rip-rap and other armoring go in to "protect" a particular property, property to either side usually experiences faster bluff erosion. This is certainly the case with the bluff above bedrock in every armoring location on the midcoast. I leave doubters to consult ther geology texts for the basic natural processes involved…
October 03, 2006
Question: What notable lives in the house with the rip-rap?
The full arc of this cove has long been a location for damaging effects of several kinds of bluff armoring associated with individual properties. Another question: Why should everyone have their natural environment degraded by a few who were crazy enough to build or buy developed properties on soft, retreating ocean bluffs? This questin will be repeated more frequently as sea level rises and we get more intense storms.
Carl May
October 03, 2006
Who better to say "no" to damaging changes to local environments and communities than the people who live in them. Being called a "NIMBY" by developers should be taken as an appellation of honor by local people seeking authority over their own lives. People need to read *all* of Proposition 90. Hint: the Supreme-Court-approved abuse of eminent domain that allows government to take property from one private entity to give to another private entity is being used as a stalking horse for something else.…
September 30, 2006
Um, Janet, you know Ph.D. is also commonly taken to mean "Piled higher, Deeper," following in progression from B.S. and M.S. degrees below it. Can we really be certain what Barry had in mind when he keyboarded those three letters? Maybe a psychologist would have insight, ergo the ire? Heck, any school kid can see that a bigger pipe coming into an area coveted by developers but already using water in quantities that are not locally sustainable is an expansion of infrastructure that will be growth-inducing--even…
September 23, 2006
Apparently the worsening situation on the midcoast, including HMB, through growth following every infrastructure expansion for the past thirty years is not reality to some who hold their growth ethic and head-n-the-sand myths closely. Every major intersection in HMB "improved" with lights, more lanes, restriping, etc., over the past twenty years. Result: congestion worse than before. Major new intersections with additional lanes and lights at Frenchman's Creek and Coronado. Result: new major congestion…
September 22, 2006
If one calls all the additional accidents, deaths, excuses for development, greater delays and congestion, and more hardscaping that have hammered the coastside with numerous highway infrastructure expansions since the slide outage of '82-'83 not based on fact--well that is to be expected from a faction basing its desires on repeatedly failed myths. Due to population/driver growth, as many drivers must go through the enlarged and improved intersections of HMB and the midcoast when the slide is open…
September 22, 2006
Myths are real, especially those which have been behind repeated failures in the past when suggestions based on them have been tried? Such as the thoroughly discredited myth that a little more damaging, growth-inducing infrastructure is all that is needed to solve traffic and water problems?
Carl May
September 22, 2006
Very weird, these local development discussions. They often seem to be conducted by people who got here yesterday, have read no background material on their areas of concern, have no idea how the overdeveloped coastside got to be how it is, are unaware of faulty planning decisions that were made repeatedly over the years by county and HMB governments, do not know the actual authority of various government sectors and bureaucracies in play and how citizens interact with those offices (some truly ignorant…
September 21, 2006
When ones sees noted factual shortages and trends that have already pushed the coastside beyond sustainability called "opinion," one wonder if those who would assume the mantle of reason care anything about the numbers, the quantities, the empirical condition of our place. Using terms like "smart growth" and "sustainability" for their contemporary cachet and to frame convenient arguments without knowing their meanings and implications gives lie to the assertions of facile word manipulators. Those…
September 19, 2006
"Population growth and increased development are inevitable;" The whole discussion loses it on the first bulleted point in the article (quoted above). While a version of the well-implanted (and artificially contrived, for those who have bothered to look into the directions chosen and promulgated by the economic elite in the U.S. since WWII) "growth ethic," there are no real-world underpinnings that make the ethic a "natural law of the universe." There isn't even a good theory behind the ethic; and…
August 29, 2006
Lori Jesper's comments have me very, very worried. Recalling that the paid (caucasian) out-of-towners collecting signatures at shopping centers on the petition for a vote on the quarry development looked a bit rugged and possibly on the dirty side, I now realize, belatedly, they were most likely terrorizing recreationists from economically depressed areas of the Rockies. Can it be a coincidence that people from a region pock-marked with abandoned open-pit mines--many of them Superfund sites--are…
August 29, 2006
Matt, We all make embarrassng typos. I used to be an editor and cannot believe some of the things I have written when "live typing." I wasn't going to reply to your message--not because of a few keyboarding slips but because your comments indicate you are doggedly stuck in a cornucopian growth perspective. I can point that out, but I can't dictate a critical-thinking approach to someone who accepts the "inevitability" of an impossible situation on blind faith. I don't doubt your sincerity, just your…
August 21, 2006
Molly,
Just a heads up for your neighbor or anyone else who does some cutting and stump grinding that leaves a pile of wood chips they don't want.
Some of us have ongoing needs for chips/sawdust for use in composting and gardening. Put up a message on Coastsider and Midcoast-L and they will probably find people eager to remove the chips for nothing.
Carl May
August 21, 2006
Things won't get really good until the eventual Consolidated Fire District of North America (CFDNorthAmerica) combines with CFDSouth America, CFDEurAsia, CFDAfrica, the grossly undersized CFDAustralia, and the microscopic CFDAntarctica. Sure there will be cost savings through combination of continental administrations, but the underlying rationale and logic is to be found in the uplifting, cooperative record we humans have in the global areas of religion, peace, environment, and prosperous life support.…
August 21, 2006
Loss of local control from the Point Montara District to a minority position in a consolidation with a larger neighboring district with different conditions (geographic and demographic makeup) is OK but loss of operations from that consolidated district to CDF is not? Let's get our principles on self-determination and serving community needs straight! Ex-firefighters are not OK on fire district boards; but when you agree with the votes of ex-firefighters in majority positions on boards, those votes…
Page 21 of 26 pages ‹ First < 19 20 21 22 23 > Last ›
Facebook
Twitter
RSS