4 ms·

Lake Salagou was designed to drown the village of Celles, but never did

36 points by acsillag 7y ago

knolax 7y ago
> “Some people think it’s good, but it would be especially good if it wasn’t in their [former] house,” This implies that some of the people expropriated didn't their get homes back. Instead of getting new families to move in why not simply return these people their homes.
- mark-r 7y ago
  I think in many (most?) cases the former owners simply aren't alive anymore. Presumably they were paid for the houses when they were kicked out too, so that would complicate things.
  - droithomme 7y ago
    This same thing has happened in the USA as well. TVA will use eminent domain to seize a bunch of properties, paying fair market value (usually a little bit above appraisal, hardly enough to compensate for having one's farm destroyed and needing to start over), and then sometimes the project falls through or gets cancelled. 20, 30, 50 years later, the property is sitting there, now federal land, no one on it, with no planned use for the future. It would make sense to sell it to someone to use, but they never do. They just squat on vast acreages acquired for obsolete projects. New London Connecticut went to the Supreme Court to establish the right of local governments to seize private property on behalf of for-profit multinational corporations, under the theory that the corporation would pay more in tax and thus evicting the owner and seizing their home is a public good. Connecticut won and established this right permanently as fundamental to the Constitution, unable to be challenged or diminished by law. New London's corporate master then decided they didn't really want the land after all. Owner was cast out and her life destroyed, her house sitting rotting to this day, no taxes at all being collected. But thank God the corporations have this new Constitutional right to seize any private property under eminent domain!
    - DoofusOfDeath 7y ago
      I agree that that SCOTUS decision was horrifying, but I'm assuming that the justices did their best to faithfully interpret the Constitution. I imagine Congress could pass laws or Constitutional amendments to undo the damage, if sufficiently motivated.
- Talanes 7y ago
  It's been fifty years, the homes are all just ruins now, and there's a massive ecological shift that has completely changed it from the place they remember. I doubt anyone who isn't already there and involved wants to come back.
crystaldev 7y ago
The verb is inundate.
- droithomme 7y ago
  I agree that inundate is more correct, but the article itself uses drowned: > How to Make Sense of an Undrowned Town ... > Then, local government decided the inhabitants of Celles would be evicted so the whole area could be drowned.
Jgrubb 7y ago
This exact same thing happened just over the hill from where I live now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocks_Island_Dam_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocks_Island_Dam_controversy
- labster 7y ago
  Except in your case, they never built a dam, while in OP they did, but a few meters shorter. Exact, give or take a few million liters of water.
- mirimir 7y ago
  Also: https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/04/nyregion/instead-of-a-dam-a-delaware-river-ghost-town.html https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/04/nyregion/instead-of-a-dam...
zokier 7y ago
Article tells nice story but offers little explanation. Why did the lake end up 11 m shallower than planned? Why starting to rebuild took fifty years? What does "bail réel solidaire" actually mean? Also they are planning to have 35 people in the village, that sounds very tiny.
- mytailorisrich 7y ago
  The French Wikipedia page on Celles [1] hints at an explanation. It says that the initial project was to fill the dam in two phases, first to 139m, then to 150m. Celles is at 144m on average. So I'm thinking that there was a change of plan for some reason and that the dam stayed filled up to 139m only. The article goes on to say that the official decision to definitively keep the water level that way was only made in 1996, which may also explain why no project to rebuild was authorised earlier. [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celles_(H%C3%A9rault) https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celles_(H%C3%A9rault)
- feb 7y ago
  Le "bail réel solidaire" is a special type of lease contract in France created in 2015. It's used by state institutions to rent buildings to poorer people at decent prices. Those lease contracts grant some long term property rights. Unlike normal lease contracts, the duration goes from 18 to 99 years. The contracts don't transfer the ownership of the building itself and have mechanisms to avoid real estate speculation which drive the prices up. Source: https://location-immobilier.ooreka.fr/astuce/voir/590869/bail-reel-solidaire https://location-immobilier.ooreka.fr/astuce/voir/590869/bai...
Zardoz84 7y ago
Meanwhile on Spain, a recovered village would be demolished and the people that recovered it, are being punished to pay the demolition. (on spanish) https://www.elsaltodiario.com/pueblos-recuperados/llamada-defender-pueblo-recuperado-fraguas https://www.elsaltodiario.com/pueblos-recuperados/llamada-de...
emmelaich 7y ago
> All tourist business will be conducted in a single co-op building, and will be run collectively. IOW, guaranteed to fail.

36 points by acsillag 7y ago

> “Some people think it’s good, but it would be especially good if it wasn’t in their [former] house,” This implies that some of the people expropriated didn't their get homes back. Instead of getting new families to move in why not simply return these people their homes.

mark-r 7y ago
I think in many (most?) cases the former owners simply aren't alive anymore. Presumably they were paid for the houses when they were kicked out too, so that would complicate things.
- droithomme 7y ago
  This same thing has happened in the USA as well. TVA will use eminent domain to seize a bunch of properties, paying fair market value (usually a little bit above appraisal, hardly enough to compensate for having one's farm destroyed and needing to start over), and then sometimes the project falls through or gets cancelled. 20, 30, 50 years later, the property is sitting there, now federal land, no one on it, with no planned use for the future. It would make sense to sell it to someone to use, but they never do. They just squat on vast acreages acquired for obsolete projects. New London Connecticut went to the Supreme Court to establish the right of local governments to seize private property on behalf of for-profit multinational corporations, under the theory that the corporation would pay more in tax and thus evicting the owner and seizing their home is a public good. Connecticut won and established this right permanently as fundamental to the Constitution, unable to be challenged or diminished by law. New London's corporate master then decided they didn't really want the land after all. Owner was cast out and her life destroyed, her house sitting rotting to this day, no taxes at all being collected. But thank God the corporations have this new Constitutional right to seize any private property under eminent domain!
  - DoofusOfDeath 7y ago
    I agree that that SCOTUS decision was horrifying, but I'm assuming that the justices did their best to faithfully interpret the Constitution. I imagine Congress could pass laws or Constitutional amendments to undo the damage, if sufficiently motivated.
Talanes 7y ago
It's been fifty years, the homes are all just ruins now, and there's a massive ecological shift that has completely changed it from the place they remember. I doubt anyone who isn't already there and involved wants to come back.

crystaldev 7y ago

The verb is inundate.

droithomme 7y ago
I agree that inundate is more correct, but the article itself uses drowned: > How to Make Sense of an Undrowned Town ... > Then, local government decided the inhabitants of Celles would be evicted so the whole area could be drowned.

Jgrubb 7y ago

This exact same thing happened just over the hill from where I live now. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocks_Island_Dam_controversy https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Tocks_Island_Dam_controversy

labster 7y ago
Except in your case, they never built a dam, while in OP they did, but a few meters shorter. Exact, give or take a few million liters of water.
mirimir 7y ago
Also: https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/04/nyregion/instead-of-a-dam-a-delaware-river-ghost-town.html https://www.nytimes.com/1990/09/04/nyregion/instead-of-a-dam...

zokier 7y ago

Article tells nice story but offers little explanation. Why did the lake end up 11 m shallower than planned? Why starting to rebuild took fifty years? What does "bail réel solidaire" actually mean? Also they are planning to have 35 people in the village, that sounds very tiny.

mytailorisrich 7y ago
The French Wikipedia page on Celles [1] hints at an explanation. It says that the initial project was to fill the dam in two phases, first to 139m, then to 150m. Celles is at 144m on average. So I'm thinking that there was a change of plan for some reason and that the dam stayed filled up to 139m only. The article goes on to say that the official decision to definitively keep the water level that way was only made in 1996, which may also explain why no project to rebuild was authorised earlier. [1] https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celles_(H%C3%A9rault) https://fr.wikipedia.org/wiki/Celles_(H%C3%A9rault)
feb 7y ago
Le "bail réel solidaire" is a special type of lease contract in France created in 2015. It's used by state institutions to rent buildings to poorer people at decent prices. Those lease contracts grant some long term property rights. Unlike normal lease contracts, the duration goes from 18 to 99 years. The contracts don't transfer the ownership of the building itself and have mechanisms to avoid real estate speculation which drive the prices up. Source: https://location-immobilier.ooreka.fr/astuce/voir/590869/bail-reel-solidaire https://location-immobilier.ooreka.fr/astuce/voir/590869/bai...

Zardoz84 7y ago

Meanwhile on Spain, a recovered village would be demolished and the people that recovered it, are being punished to pay the demolition. (on spanish) https://www.elsaltodiario.com/pueblos-recuperados/llamada-defender-pueblo-recuperado-fraguas https://www.elsaltodiario.com/pueblos-recuperados/llamada-de...

emmelaich 7y ago

> All tourist business will be conducted in a single co-op building, and will be run collectively. IOW, guaranteed to fail.