How rising sea levels could affect Seattle-area rails

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CHamilton

Engineer
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Gathering Team Member
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Jul 13, 2011
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Link and the Rising Seas

Plausible sea level predictions do have implications for Sound Transit’s long range plan.

Sound Transit 1 and 2 rail lines will suffer little in the next hundred years or so, although the elevated Boeing Access Road section may become a causeway over water. Although Seattle is fortunate to find most of itself at elevation, Sound Transit 3 and beyond face serious constraints. Hopefully, Seattle will allow thriving, dense neighborhoods to grow around those stations; if those station areas are under immediate threat, the value of the entire alignment is doubtful....

South Sounder [and Amtrak Cascades between Seattle and Tacoma] looks to be in pretty good shape; coastal North Sounder [Cascades and Empire Builder between Seattle and Everett], not so much.
 
It's an interesting exercise to look at rising sea levels... but I like to think that we as a nation and world wouldn't let it get that bad.

I think the most interesting part of this study is that it shows the Port of Tacoma almost entirely under water.
 
It's an interesting exercise to look at rising sea levels... but I like to think that we as a nation and world wouldn't let it get that bad.
You're late to the party. An amazing chunk of sea level rise is already locked-in; we can only keep it from getting worse.

More importantly, now is the time to plan for the inevitable. It'll be far more expensive to fix this later.
 
Sorry if I am unimpressed. I have been around long enough to remember the global cooling / impending ice age panic of the 1970's. I am even less convinced that there is anything worth doing that can be done by regulation or "lifestyle" changes. One of the best cures for belief in certainties of the nature of such "scientific" fads and panics is to read those of years past, preferably going well into the past. Wait another decade or so we may be looking at panic over falling sea levels, declining average temperatures, increased rainfalls in deserts destroying their ecology, or something or other form of "the sky is falling"
 
Rather than be smug in your ignorance, educate yourself.

We are overdue for an ice age, but, for some reason, it isn't happening. That should give you pause.

If you had looked at the past, you'd see that temperatures *are* rising, as are sea levels. Glaciers and polar ice *are* melting. You'd have to be blind to miss it, because it's actually happening on a human time scale.

This "fad" has been with us for over thirty years. Every decade the predicions get worse. Every year the reality is worse than predicted.

Of course there's a possibility that scientists are completely wrong about global climate change. There's also a chance that unicorns exist. I'd put my money on unicorns -- but that's just me.

However, on the reasonable chance that they are right, people should act now. If we sit back and wait to find out, it may be too late.
 
Sorry if I am unimpressed. I have been around long enough to remember the global cooling / impending ice age panic of the 1970's. I am even less convinced that there is anything worth doing that can be done by regulation or "lifestyle" changes. One of the best cures for belief in certainties of the nature of such "scientific" fads and panics is to read those of years past, preferably going well into the past. Wait another decade or so we may be looking at panic over falling sea levels, declining average temperatures, increased rainfalls in deserts destroying their ecology, or something or other form of "the sky is falling"
Yep, history is full of examples:

1902 - LA Times > Glaciers are undergoing 'their final anniliation' due warming.

1923 - ChicagoTribune front page> "Scientist say Artic ice will wipe out Canada"

1932 - New York Times > (May special supplement):

Continuing end of the last ice age, not human activity cause of warming trend.

1970's - Science, Science Digest, Newsweek, Time, etc.: Global cooling - ice age.

Present - Global warming.

Journalist - magazine editor H.L. Mencken (1860-1956) may have been on to something long ago:

"The [news media] is a device for making the ignorant more ignorant and the crazy crazier."

"The whole aim of practical politics is to keep the populace alarmed by menacing it with an endless series of hobgoblins, all of them imaginary."
 
Rather than be smug in your ignorance, educate yourself.

We are overdue for an ice age, but, for some reason, it isn't happening. That should give you pause.

If you had looked at the past, you'd see that temperatures *are* rising, as are sea levels. Glaciers and polar ice *are* melting. You'd have to be blind to miss it, because it's actually happening on a human time scale.

This "fad" has been with us for over thirty years. Every decade the predicions get worse. Every year the reality is worse than predicted.

Of course there's a possibility that scientists are completely wrong about global climate change. There's also a chance that unicorns exist. I'd put my money on unicorns -- but that's just me.

However, on the reasonable chance that they are right, people should act now. If we sit back and wait to find out, it may be too late.
At risk of taking this topic further off topic. If you read the data and read it back for millions or billions of years, you'll see that the temps are cyclical. Sure, if you look at the very short-term you'll see a rise, just as if you look at another short period, you'll see a decline. The same data that these scientists point at and say "we're warming!" also says we're just at the peak of a cycle. We've only had accurate global temperature measurements for about 150 years, and really only for the past 50 or so. You can no more draw the conclusion that the globe is warming from this data, than you can say it's cooling by watching the temp go from 80 at noon to 60 at night.
 
Getting back on topic more or less.

The rising sea level over the last few decades is a fact. Whether that continues - I expect it will continue - .

The Pacific Northwest, and Seattle in particular, have lots more to worry about than sea-level rise.

Like tectonic plate-colliding earthquake and such.

There's some pretty good evidence that the land-level (independent of sea-level) has lurched a hundred meters or so within the last 10,000 years.

Like - Google it - upland forest now under water -- how old? A few thousand years more or less.

See the museum at Neah Bay.

The tectonic upthrust is a ratcheting thing. When the rocks can't hold the force any more - big click up or down.

Love Seattle - when the next tectonic click happens -- who knows?
 
RickC

I think the most interesting part of this study is that it shows the Port of Tacoma almost entirely under water.
It was underwater at one time. I read years ago and as the map link shows, the valley where Puyallup, Auburn, Kent are and on to Seattle were a part of Puget Sound. The land running from Seattle to Tacoma where SeaTac airport is located was an island at one time.

http://goo.gl/maps/7MX71
 
Let's call it rapid climate change, which is what it is. Whether has gotten more turbulent and extreme in both directions, and let's leave it at that.
 
Sorry if I am unimpressed.
Please get a clue. I actually follow the scientific literature. You obviously don't.
The popular press is full of nonsense and always has been. The serious scientific literature is a different matter. Global cooling was never more than a speculation. Global warming is proven fact. (And yes, to forestall idiotic responses, *global* warming will make *some* places colder as climate patterns are disrupted.)

The EPA and the insurance companies are updating their flood zone maps as we speak. They're smart and informed.

Don't want to trust me? Read the literature yourself. Educate yourself enough to be able to read it.

What, you don't want to spend the time to do that? Then you have to trust the people who do read it.
 
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At risk of taking this topic further off topic. If you read the data and read it back for millions or billions of years, you'll see that the temps are cyclical.
You need to learn more geology, because you're misreading the evidence. Yes, there are cycles... there are several different scales of cycle on a geological timescale.
The biggest one is this: there are two semi-stable states, "hothouse earth" and "icehouse earth". Within each there are smaller cycles.

What humans are doing right now -- massive belching of CO2 into the atmosphere -- looks exactly like the pattern we see during a shift from "icehouse earth" to "hothouse earth". These changes are usually associated with gigantic mass extinctions. (As are the changes from hothouse to icehouse.) We are currently experiencing a gigantic mass extinction, by the way.

The real problem is that humans, *and everything we eat*, evolved during "icehouse earth".

In a "hothouse earth" there were jungle-like conditions at the poles. Lots of creatures were just fine with this, but humans would find most of the earth uninhabitable, and we'd also starve to death.

The earth isn't at risk. Life on earth will be fine. We are not going to become Venus, which had runaway global warming which just went on forever. Some unidentified feedback effect (probably related to plant growth) seems to suppress further temperature rises after we reach "hothouse earth" levels.

It's humans who are at risk. The correct analogy is "Fouling our own nests".

Sure, if you look at the very short-term you'll see a rise, just as if you look at another short period, you'll see a decline. The same data that these scientists point at and say "we're warming!" also says we're just at the peak of a cycle.
No, it doesn't. That's just false. We're nowhere near a peak on the "smaller cycles". With the standard "smaller cycles", we're actually supposed to be on a *trough* in temperature. But we aren't.
On the larger cycle between icehouse and hothouse, we are unfortunately also nowhere near a peak. It could get much, much worse.

By the way? We have accurate global temperature measurements for millions of years based on ice cores from the Arctic and based on various more complex geological methods of assessment.
 
By the way? We have accurate global temperature measurements for millions of years based on ice cores from the Arctic and based on various more complex geological methods of assessment.
This can't possibly be true since the earth is only 6,000 years old! This has to be true, I heard Dr. Limbaugh and Professor Palin tell us this on their radio show and TV Show on Fixed Noise!

And all the "conservative" talking heads talk about "junk science" which is whatever trained, experienced scientists say as opposed to findamentist preachers and t-bag fanatics spouting nonsense about intelligent design and climate cycles!

You could look it up! As Casey Stengel used to say!
 
I've always found fighting for the environment itself something of a lost cause. Too many people with too much misinformation in their heads, and too many mechanisms bigger than myself to perpetuate it.
 
What if we did everything we could to clean up our emissions and it turned out we were wrong about global warming? Then all we'd be left with is a fairly clean environment. Imagine how horrible that would be.
 
Trggdor, I am all for getting the cleanest environment practical to achieve. Global warming to me is a side issue, even if real. My main concern is that by getting so tied up with global warming that if and when its impending arrival loses credibility that the push to clean up the environment will also lose urgency and maybe even its credibility. That I certainly do not want to happen. So, let's keep the emphasis on reducing consumption of resources without tying it to something else which may or may not turn out to be real. The worst thing to do is to increase energy consumption as part of reducing some form of emission. I remain totally unconvinced that CO2 emissions is a disaster. Ask any plant. CO, yes, many other things yes, they are detrimental, but CO2??.

One primary reason I have spent most of my working life involved in rail transit is because I believe in reducing consumption of fuel, all kinds, and doing so with minimum negative effect on standard of living.

One final thought: what any of us choose to believe or disbelieve on global warming or any other subject has not effect whatsoever on reality.
 
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Sechs

An amazing chunk of sea level rise is already locked-in; we can only keep it from getting worse.
Really?

La Jolla 1871 at high tide

80-2860.jpg


About 140 years later at high tide. Looks like no change to me.

090207-LaJollaCove.jpg


JimHudson

And all the "conservative" talking heads....
Is Prince Gore your go-to guy?

Neroden

I actually follow the scientific literature.
Are these your scientific sources?

[SIZE=14pt]2007: Chief of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), “If there’s no action before 2012, that’s too late.”[/SIZE]



Jan. 19, 2009: James Hansen, climate expert [alleged] and past head of NASA’s Goddard Institute of Space Studies: President Obama has only four years to save the Earth.



11.10.13: Mother Jones article, “Climate deniers like to point to the so-called global warming “hiatusbecause of a slowdown in buildup of greenhouse gas.



4.13.14: USA Today, (IPCC states), “…global emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases have accelerated to unprecedented levels…” [They left out warming hasn’t happened for 17 years contradicting the above item!].









 
A lot of the people who argue against climate change are plucking holes in theories and evidence^.

But the absence of proof is not the same as proof of absence.

What would have happened if say, we had disregarded warnings over the AIDS epidemic by highlighting anecdotal evidence of some HIV positive people who were still doing fine, or of some HIV positive people dying of causes unrelated to AIDS. Does that in any way prove that AIDS doesn't kill?

Or how about telling people that there's no point in locking your door at night as sometimes burglars come in through the window anyway.

That is more or less what the anti global warming people are doing. I see no proof from them that there isn't global warming, but just riding about on truisms and details that when seen in isolation might sufggest something other than the bigger picture.

For me, it's better to be on the safe side. Emissions and pollution cannot be a good thing, no matter how you look at it. Reducing emissions and pollution may at worst have no effect whatsoever, but at best may make things better. Is that alone not a good reason to try and get our house in order?
 
Trggdor, I am all for getting the cleanest environment practical to achieve. Global warming to me is a side issue, even if real. My main concern is that by getting so tied up with global warming that if and when its impending arrival loses credibility that the push to clean up the environment will also lose urgency and maybe even its credibility. That I certainly do not want to happen. So, let's keep the emphasis on reducing consumption of resources without tying it to something else which may or may not turn out to be real. The worst thing to do is to increase energy consumption as part of reducing some form of emission. I remain totally unconvinced that CO2 emissions is a disaster. Ask any plant. CO, yes, many other things yes, they are detrimental, but CO2??.

One primary reason I have spent most of my working life involved in rail transit is because I believe in reducing consumption of fuel, all kinds, and doing so with minimum negative effect on standard of living.

One final thought: what any of us choose to believe or disbelieve on global warming or any other subject has not effect whatsoever on reality.
I couldn't agree more with your point, and I do believe in the danger of CO2 emissions.
 
Sechs

An amazing chunk of sea level rise is already locked-in; we can only keep it from getting worse.
Really?

La Jolla 1871 at high tide

80-2860.jpg


About 140 years later at high tide. Looks like no change to me.

090207-LaJollaCove.jpg


JimHudson

And all the "conservative" talking heads....
Is Prince Gore your go-to guy?

Neroden

I actually follow the scientific literature.
Are these your scientific sources?

2007: Chief of the UN Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change (IPCC), If theres no action before 2012, thats too late.



Jan. 19, 2009: James Hansen, climate expert [alleged] and past head of NASAs Goddard Institute of Space Studies: President Obama has only four years to save the Earth.



11.10.13: Mother Jones article, Climate deniers like to point to the so-called global warming hiatus because of a slowdown in buildup of greenhouse gas.



4.13.14: USA Today, (IPCC states), global emissions of heat-trapping greenhouse gases have accelerated to unprecedented levels [They left out warming hasnt happened for 17 years contradicting the above item!].









Can't you guys register so I can reference you by name instead of quoting your whole fahrkahkta post?

Anyway, just because the world has kept existing does not mean our world is not past the point of no return. I don't know if it is or not. That's irrelevant to my point. My point is your post is full of the most irrelevant fact twisting none sense I have seen this morning.
 
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Since I do use my real name on AU you know who to quote and as to Al Gore, he would have been a terrible President (but not as bad as the King Maker Supreme Court installed one!) But Gores movie "An Inconvoent Truth" was first rate! (Watch the Glaciers and Poles melt!)

My problem with people quoting such "scientists" as Limbaugh and Palin and Fundamentalist Preachers is that they have no training, no experience and just make stuff up!

The real problem IMO is too many people in the world using too much hydrocarbon

based stuff! YMMV
 
Why are we wasting millions of dollars on scientific instruments and stuff when we can just look at pictures!?!?!

Clearly comparing two photographs from 140 years apart is a vastly superior method for conducting scientific research! Someone give that man a Nobel Prize for Being Awesome!

Climate change deniers are going to come off looking about as foolish as the flat earther crowd.

I'm also a big fan of the "Scientists were wrong about something in the past, therefore anything a scientist says is completely untrue" reasoning.

I read something untrue on the internet once, so clearly everything I read on the internet today is a big fat lie.

And doctors once though disease was caused by bad humors. Clearly, that means all doctors are wrong and I'm just going to avoid all medical treatment from them in the future.
 
Reducing emissions and pollution and global warming do not need to be linked, and better if they are not.

I see no point in saying more in dealing with the convinced. Warming might happen or it might not.

And people would starve to death in a jungle like climate? Get real. That is about the same as starving to death in a restaurant. Ask any of the various groups that live in jungle climates. Why are many of them still primitive? Because they do not have to work harder to have all they need.
 
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