When our local shopping centre fills up with rain water, due to the poor drainage, one of the shopkeepers puts a big plastic shark fin in the middle. So far, it hasn't influenced the mall owner to fix the drainage issue.
During annual stormwater overflows like this Seattle and King County still drain almost 2 billion gallons of shit, piss and petroleum products into Puget Sound. North the County's' working with Snomohish County (Edmonds et al.) to finish the Brightwater system, scheduled to go online next summer. Portland's in much the same boat and is working hard to revamp their system. Having EPA breathing down everybody's necks is a nice spur.
"During the CSO discharge and for 48 hours following the discharge, water users near the CSO locations are at risk from exposure to bacteria in the water." Ahem. http://www.kingcounty.gov/environment/wa…
Blech. This was written about Victoria, BC in 2009, after they finally caved to pressure to stop dumping raw sewage into the ocean:
Why should a modern city that bills itself as a tourist destination and the gateway to Vancouver Island’s pristine forests, waterways and beaches continue to function like a Third World village with no access to sewage treatment technology and processes? And how sustainable would it be if every city and town in the world took the same approach?
I would think that how one treats shit would be a good measure of evaluation for a state or province.
Re: Victoria. Sewer treatment centers take up a lot of seaside real-estate and don't smell too fine. If nature doesn't have trouble with man dumping it directly into the Strait of Juan de Fuca, which circulates quite well, then what's the big problem?
"Sewer treatment centers take up a lot of seaside real-estate and don't smell too fine."
The Seattle West Point sewage treatment plant in Discovery Park is odorless. You can't smell if even if you take one of their occasional (Earth Day?) tours. It's also extremely well screened visually in all directions. Time to give local government a really big pat on the back.
@9 This isn't really my area of expertise, genman, but as I understand it, it's not a problem with a small amount of poop, in fact, many citites had just this arrangement for a long time (my beloved Boston being one of them.) The problem is that poop introduces things that occur naturally, like nitrogen, in larger amounts than can be accommodated, which can lead to an overgrowth of some things, and can kill off other things, and people's poop also has antibiotics and other stuff that is generally not good to introduce to a healthy ecosystem. As cities continue to grow, and dump ever increasing amounts of crappage into the water unchecked, it will at some point become more than the ecosystem can handle. If Mr. Canuck were awake, he could give you all the technical terms and big words, but he is not...
"During the CSO discharge and for 48 hours following the discharge, water users near the CSO locations are at risk from exposure to bacteria in the water." Ahem.
http://www.kingcounty.gov/environment/wa…
I would think that how one treats shit would be a good measure of evaluation for a state or province.
*didja see how I did that, gus?
Luckier, I wish you much Purell.
The Seattle West Point sewage treatment plant in Discovery Park is odorless. You can't smell if even if you take one of their occasional (Earth Day?) tours. It's also extremely well screened visually in all directions. Time to give local government a really big pat on the back.
Are your really in favor of dumping huge quantities of untreated human shit into the Salish Sea? Fuck you.