In a message dated 1/16/2010 6:18:47 A.M. Eastern Standard Time, [log in to unmask] writes: Unfortunately for the magazine and common belief, the Chernobyl area is now a wonderland of nature. Everybody say hello to Blinky the 3-eyed fish! It recovered fine when the humans were forcibly removed. Animal life times are too short for radiation to make as much as a difference as now having abundant food and few predators. I don't doubt that there are more plants and animals growing there now than there were when people were there. But which of us would eat, or want our children to eat, any kind of food, animal or vegetable, known to have grown there? steve, Yes, I agree that wastelands do not always perform as anticipated. But if we are going to have a periodical focused on death and destruction, humans vs. nature, then may we need a few upbeat stories here and there? So then, and not wanting to get myself into deep water with detached speculation, would it make rational sense to relocate the total population of Haiti and essentially shut the country down? Send them to Houston Jim of D and L Electric might have something to say about having 6 or 7 million Haitians added to the population of Houston, Ken. and France France, on the other hand, is an excellent idea. Mastic Beach might work too, but it's a little close to Jersey for my taste.? Plant a whole lot of trees and leave them alone for a while.I don't think you need to plant any trees in Haiti. But a rebar factory might be just the thing. There was some reporter on TV last night talking about how even though concrete is a cheap material, it was made even less expensive in (poor) Haiti by use of too much sand, and that's why all the buildings collapsed. I, however, don't remember seeing much rebar sticking out of the collapsed buildings there, and if they are too cheap and/or poor and/or crooked to put enough cement into the concrete, there ain't gonna be a whole lotta rebar goin' on. Especially with no building code, or at least no decent one, plenty of corruption, and an unbelievable poverty. As I think about it, they would have been better off in an earthquake if they lived in grass huts, rather than improperly constructed concrete, or unreinforced masonry, buildings. A Richter Scale 7 earthquake with its epicenter in Mahnattan, would do tremendous damage to unreinforced, or inadequately reinforced, masonry for miles around. I bet you'd lose most everything built before about 1920, and a fair amount of everything built before 1968 or so. Those galvanized brick ties were expensive, ya know....In the case of the Chernobyl contamination zone the population was loaded onto buses on very short notice, essentially with no explanation, and removed from the area. It was all over the place excruciatingly painful for people. The Soviets may have been able to get away with such a population transfer back then, and it sounds to me like it was necessary, but I don't think anybody but the North Koreans would try such a thing now. Besides which, these earthquakes happen only once in 200 years, and (speaking in my capacity as a Californian in exile, which exile is not the result of earthquakophobia) it would be crazy to abandon half the island because of so infrequent an event. I know! Let's send all the unemployed contractors to Haiti and let them rebuild the place properly. After the unemployed architects get paid (in full) to design all new buildings, of course. ][< Ralph -- **Please remember to trim posts, as requested in the Terms of Service** To terminate puerile preservation prattling among pals and the uncoffee-ed, or to change your settings, go to: <http://listserv.icors.org/archives/bullamanka-pinheads.html>