
Plan To Build Giant Floating Airport Off California Coast - randomwalker
http://www.infrastructurist.com/2009/10/22/crazy-or-brilliant-plan-to-build-a-floating-airport-off-the-california-coast/
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joe_the_user
I always loved these schemes and it took me a while to understand why they are
inherently _expensive_ and so are not likely to appear soon.

The reason is that a man-made structure on the water is subject to continuous
strain and thus continual and so needs continual repair. The larger the
structure, the more that this becomes a problem. Bridge and ships fall apart
over time and still require continuous maintenance while they're in their
lifetime.

It's appealing but like the underwater city, it would be enormously
impractical.

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indiejade
Well, the Earth is over 70 percent water. It seems that expanding our
habitable space to exist on a marine environment is more feasible than, say,
building a colony in outer space.

Grumpy travelers' concerns aside, it could be a really neat concept akin to a
destination in and on its own. Like an EPCOT center, but factoring in the
economic, environmental and social issues of building a floating city. An
engineer's dream . . ..

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d3w4rd
No mention of expenses for passengers. Given transportation to/from the coast,
I'd guess a plane ticket in/out of here would be prohibitively expensive in
both time and money.

And building a 4 story metropolis underneath doesn't make sense unless there
is a reason to visit. Hotels, conference centers and shopping centers,
wouldn't be enough, at least for me.

~~~
hopstar
"No mention of expenses for passengers."

Nor of the time factor involved. Commercial flights already take the better
part of a day, even for short jumps. I can't imagine having to arrive at the
ferry terminal 4-5 hours before my flight so that I can get to the terminal in
time to spend 2 more hours waiting for ticketing and security and all the
other delays.

"And building a 4 story metropolis underneath doesn't make sense unless there
is a reason to visit"

I think his comment about "free trade zones" hints at the reason for so much
office space. It seems to me that it would be a conveniently located off-shore
haven for businesses (especially from Asia) who do massive amounts of shipping
in and out of the ports of SD and LA.

They could also build the Duty-free version of the Mall of America; 400-500
stores full of tax-free stuff that would appeal to international travelers.

It's an interesting concept, and in a way it seems like the only viable
solution. With the massive sprawl surrounding SD I think you'd have to go a
good 2 hours from the central city to find a big enough patch of land to build
a new airport.

~~~
hristov
"With the massive sprawl surrounding SD I think you'd have to go a good 2
hours from the central city to find a big enough patch of land to build a new
airport."

Not even close. San diego is not really that big. For example, it is a 30 min
drive from downtown to alpine which is a small town in the middle of nowhere,
where the more sensible plans put the new airport. That travel time can be
shortened with high speed rail and it would still be many times cheaper than
that ocean pipe dream.

Oh and 30 min in a car or on a train will be soo much better than 45 min on a
shaking sickness inducing ferry.

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marze
And if San Diego doesn't keep current on their fees the airport could go
somewhere else, like Shanghai.

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teeja
... vis-a-vis wiser ways of spending transportation money, considering the
most good for the greatest number and reducing carbon impact?

Time to take more holistic views of how these systems inter-relate, rather
than focusing on narrow visions.

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fuzzythinker
They should talk to google for investment (by letting google house servers
there - ocean is a great place for renewable energy and water cooling).

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briscuits
Hmm, this make anyone else thing of Tom Swift?

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tzury
after we have ruined the ground we set our feet on, it is time to start with
the ocean. wtf. leave the ocean alone as is.

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TriinT
Why not build the airport 40 miles inland, in the desert? There's no shortage
of desert land in California. Wouldn't that make so much more sense (by orders
of magnitude) than build a floating airport? Just wondering...

~~~
etal
San Diego's downtown airport is comically tiny, so this has been an issue for
awhile. The ideas proposed, in order, were:

1\. Convert the Marine base at Miramar into an airport -- nixed by the wealthy
residents of nearby La Jolla

2\. Partner with Tijuana and build a binational airport straddling TJ and San
Ysidro on some conveniently undeveloped land there. This stalled for a number
of reasons, and then some housing developments sprang up on the mesa where
this would have worked, so the idea died.

3\. Build a mega-airport in the desert, out towards El Centro, and a superfast
bullet train between there and downtown San Diego. Kind of... inconvenient,
and reeks of compromise.

4\. A floating metropolis off the coast of Point Loma! Well, Singapore's doing
something similar.

Notably, most of the flights from San Diego's downtown airport go to LAX or
other nearby hubs, and LAX to San Francisco is the most-travelled air route in
the country. These are not long distances; a decent bullet train system
connecting California's metro areas would substantially ease the congestion at
SAN, SNA, LAX, etc. and probably be more environmentally friendly, too. The CA
high-speed rail project was proposed about a decade ago, and is progressing
excruciatingly slowly -- deets here:

<http://www.cahighspeedrail.ca.gov/>

Last I heard, it was expected to begin construction in 2012, and start
carrying passengers around 2020.

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wrinklz
"In the midst of this pickle, along comes a fellow named Adam Englund. He’s a
local lawyer..."

I wouldn't trust 20 billion of the taxpayer's money to a lawyer's vision. Give
half of that to the Dyson vacuum cleaner guy. He'll come up with a design that
works.

~~~
streety
"By any measure, $20 billion is a lot of money, but Englund claims his group
isn’t seeking any government funding all they need from the Washington are
airport rights to this swath of ocean."

Although it seems a little unlikely a request for government funding won't
materialise in future it would seem that it wouldn't be for the entire amount.

