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Or looking at historical pictures of a city with street lights on at mid-day because of industrial smog ... https://www.buzzfeed.com/kevintang/stunning-photos-o

Or looking at historical pictures of a city with street lights on at mid-day because of industrial smog ... https://www.buzzfeed.com/kevintang/stunning-photos-of-pittsburghs-air-pollution-in-the-1940s https://www.buzzfeed.com/kevintang/stunning-photos-of-pittsb...

sengork 9y ago
I wonder how those pictures would compare if they were taken by the same camera technology.
- nneonneo 9y ago
  Try this on for size: https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/lastwinterthiswinter.jpg https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/lastwin... from this following article: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/01/aghast-over-beijings-air-pollution-this-was-pittsburgh-not-that-long-ago/267237/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/01/aghas... The left image is, amazingly, a daytime shot - the sun is visible in the top-left corner. The smog was so bad on that day ("Black Tuesday", November 1939) that a camera essentially could not capture any detail _in broad daylight_.
nneonneo 9y ago
I live in Pittsburgh. The air is clean now and the water is clear - but there's constant reminders that it wasn't always this way. Although most of the historic buildings were cleaned of soot, a few chose to keep some parts sooty and black as a reminder of what once was - a great example is the Mellon Institute just a few blocks from my work (https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mellon-institute-columns https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mellon-institute-columns). It did take Pittsburgh a long time to start fixing its environmental issues, and it took the total collapse of the steel industry to fully clear the air. Even back when I came here (~2011) people had an impression of Pittsburgh as a polluted, industrial hell-hole - I'm so glad that it wasn't the case when I came.
- tinus_hn 9y ago
  Good thing you elected Trump to rebuild that industry!

sengork 9y ago

I wonder how those pictures would compare if they were taken by the same camera technology.

nneonneo 9y ago
Try this on for size: https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/lastwinterthiswinter.jpg https://cdn.theatlantic.com/static/mt/assets/science/lastwin... from this following article: https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/01/aghast-over-beijings-air-pollution-this-was-pittsburgh-not-that-long-ago/267237/ https://www.theatlantic.com/technology/archive/2013/01/aghas... The left image is, amazingly, a daytime shot - the sun is visible in the top-left corner. The smog was so bad on that day ("Black Tuesday", November 1939) that a camera essentially could not capture any detail _in broad daylight_.

nneonneo 9y ago

I live in Pittsburgh. The air is clean now and the water is clear - but there's constant reminders that it wasn't always this way. Although most of the historic buildings were cleaned of soot, a few chose to keep some parts sooty and black as a reminder of what once was - a great example is the Mellon Institute just a few blocks from my work (https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mellon-institute-columns https://www.atlasobscura.com/places/mellon-institute-columns). It did take Pittsburgh a long time to start fixing its environmental issues, and it took the total collapse of the steel industry to fully clear the air. Even back when I came here (~2011) people had an impression of Pittsburgh as a polluted, industrial hell-hole - I'm so glad that it wasn't the case when I came.

tinus_hn 9y ago
Good thing you elected Trump to rebuild that industry!