
Reeling from Effects of Climate Change, Alaskan Village Votes to Relocate - jackgavigan
http://www.nytimes.com/2016/08/20/us/shishmaref-alaska-elocate-vote-climate-change.html
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strictnein
They wanted to move the town for over 40 years, but now they're "reeling" from
climate change?

Something doesn't add up there.

> "It has been grappling for decades with the loss of buildings and
> infrastructure caused by storm surges, and it has shrunk over the past 40
> years — more than 200 feet of the shore has been eaten away since 1969"

Sounds like they're just tacking on "climate change" to garner more attention
to a pre-existing issue.

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LeifCarrotson
Shoreline gets eaten away by more than climate change. In many places, the
shoreline is constantly shifting. Waterfront property is risky!

~~~
strictnein
Yeah, that's my point. They're not reeling from climate change, they're
reeling from building a city in a really bad spot.

~~~
mattkrause
The shoreline has probably changed a lot in the 400 years since that area was
settled.

Also, the IPCC report contains a graph showing that temperatures have been
increasing pretty steadily since the 1930s, so it's entirely possible that
this _is_ due to climate change.

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CWuestefeld
_more than 200 feet of the shore has been eaten away since 1969, ... Efforts
to move the town in 1973 ..._

Given those dates, it seems a stretch to lay this entirely at the feet of
climate change. AIUI, that was before the effects of climate change were being
felt (and even before, as deniers like to point out, people were worried about
global cooling)

The article says

 _a barrier island that has been steadily disappearing because of erosion and
flooding attributed to climate change._

But provides no explanation of this other than a generic link to articles on
the topic of climate change in general.

~~~
zasz
Warming has actually been increasing since the Industrial Revolution,
according to this link: [http://www.bbc.com/news/science-
environment-15874560](http://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-15874560)

~~~
kbutler
...largely because the industrial revolution happened to occur as the world
was starting to come out of the "little ice age". And if anthropogenic climate
change helped to bring the temperatures up the 1.5-2 C from that point, we're
all profoundly grateful.

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AcerbicZero
They need 180 million dollars to move 600 people ~5 miles? That seems a bit
ridiculous.

~~~
sliverstorm
I suspect "building a whole new town" is a large part of that cost.

~~~
mywittyname
For only 600 people, they should probably just move them to an existing town.

~~~
Cerium
Which is why they are fighting for this. The city has unique culture (dances,
language) that would be hard to preserve in an existing city with majority
outsiders.

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finid
> After so many years of debate and study, the question of moving remained an
> emotional topic

And it will always be an emotional topic. It's tough to let go in these
situations.

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sammydavis
This is very sad. Those poor people. It's a lot of money, but how would you
feel if your town had to move? Resistant and mad, at the least.

There must be dozens or 100s of small villages like this in Alaska that will
need to move. We can't afford to move every small village to another location.
Yet we also owe them help. I don't know what to do.

~~~
alistairSH
Move them to existing towns? That's bound to cost less than the $300k/head
they think they need to rebuild nearby.

