4 ms·
I'll voice an unpopular opinion: people should live in these dry areas. Deserts have wildlife, yes, but they have much less biomass than the other places human
by nostromo 4y ago
I'll voice an unpopular opinion: people should live in these dry areas.
Deserts have wildlife, yes, but they have much less biomass than the other places humans live. A person living in Arizona or Nevada is displacing much less natural wildlife than a person like me, living in Seattle.
So I say let's embrace people living in water-starved areas like the Southwest. We can enable it by smart water usage, like you see in Vegas, combined with things like smart water diversion and desalinization.
- thescriptkiddie 4y agoPeople who live in cities have far smaller environmental footprints than people living in suburbs or rural areas.
- woodruffw 4y agoWhat natural wildlife is someone on the 10th floor of a century-old apartment building displacing? Last time I checked, Vegas also gets the majority of its water from the Colorado River, including via Lake Mead. No amount of smart water usage is going to change the macro climate patterns here.
- nostromo 4y agoThe majority of Seattle's land use is single family houses, not unlike cities in the Southwest. Besides, apartment buildings exist in desert cities too. The question wasn't about density, it was about building in deserts or not. Building in deserts is better for the environment.
- woodruffw 4y agoSure, but it's all about proportions, both for existing and new residential construction. I would be very surprised if Arizona either has or is building high-density apartment housing at the rate that Seattle or any other dense coastal state is. There's simply less incentive to.