

Heavy machinery destroys some Nazca lines - codecurve
http://www.peruthisweek.com/news-3743-peru-heavy-machinery-destroys-nazca-lines/

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kpanghmc
The title is a bit sensationalist. None of the famous animal ones were
destroyed, just some of the straight line ones. It's ridiculous that a company
felt that they could just quarry over part of a UNESCO world heritage site,
but the title makes it seem like they're all gone when that isn't the case.

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mikecarroll
From the About Us: "PeruThisWeek.com and LivinginPeru.com are part of the Peru
Experience family, a company whose goal is to promote Peru all over the world"

I think the underlying message in this bit of sensationalist journalism is
that foreign tourists to should hurry and visit the Nazca lines right away,
before they get completely destroyed and are forever lost.

The sad thing is that Peru can barely balance the tourist traffic it gets
already while still preserving its natural sites and artifacts. Who know how
much damage to the lines would result from a rush of tourists trying to see
them before they are gone?

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clueless123
You wrote: "The sad thing is that Peru can barely balance the tourist traffic
it gets already while still preserving its natural sites and artifacts. "

Any facts/numbres to back up this claim ?

Do you mean Machu Pichu (Where this _is_ true) or all of Peru ?

I recently visited Nazca and it was not particularly busy at all. ( Compared
to last years visit to Yosemite valley it was refreshing not to wait in line
to see anything)

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mikecarroll
Yeah, sorry, no numbers... I was drawing on anecdotal experiences.

I've also been to Nazca and my impression was that though the tourist traffic
was only a tiny fraction of Machu Picchu, the town couldn't handle much more
of it. Even in off season the airport was booked to capacity and people had to
wait hours for scheduled flights.

Another example (besides Machu Picchu) that comes to mind is Paracas
(<https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Paracas_National_Reserve>). It's hardly a
mainstream tourist attraction, but the degradation from the tourist industry
was pretty apparent when I visited in 2009, despite being a protected area.

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sachingulaya
At Macchu Picchu they still allow tourists to climb all over the site. It's a
wonderful experience...but it's simply not sustainable.

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no_l0gic
I grew up across the street from David Johnson[1], who spent a lot of time in
Peru an Chile researching the Nazca Lines, and got to hear some very
interesting and scary near-death stories from him about run-ins with the
companies ruining the area - very sad to see just how much ruining is going
on.

[1] <http://www.grahamhancock.com/forum/JohnsonD1.php>
<http://people.umass.edu/proulx/Nasca_Lines_Project.html>

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Someone
AFAIK, 'world heritage site' is just a marker indicating that "UNESCO
considers it in the interest of the international community to preserve each
site". It does not, by itself, carry any legal force.

If so, claiming a land owner can't do something to his property because it is
part of such a site has no legal basis, but only a moral one.

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arethuza
I'm pretty sure you are correct - we live in a UNESCO World Heritage site
(Edinburgh New Town) and all the they seem to do is "request" and "urge" the
local authority to be sensible about planning and development decisions.

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georgecmu
Link to Nazca lines in sattelite imagery: <http://goo.gl/maps/ehh0w>

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uvdiv
Which ones are the historical valuable ones and which ones are tire tracks?

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ricardobeat
There are close to a thousand lines/drawings. Tire tracks are the ones that
look like tire tracks :)

Close-up of the are with the most interesting ones:
[https://maps.google.com/maps?q=peru+nazca&hl=en&ll=-...](https://maps.google.com/maps?q=peru+nazca&hl=en&ll=-14.694738,-75.120907&spn=0.027937,0.045018&sll=40.431368,-79.9805&sspn=0.148959,0.305214&hnear=Nazca,+Ica+Region,+Peru&t=h&z=15)

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ricardobeat
News from yesterday's Reddit front page.

