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Thread: Housing Mistakes

  1. #61
    Senior Member Waterways's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ged View Post
    Perhaps if time limits were put on making places habitable,
    Just used Land Valuation Taxation as it is self regulating. No snooping Council employees are needed.

    How Harrisburg in the US was transformed through a Land Value Tax

    In the United States, many local authorities, including Harrisburg, the capital of Pennsylvania, operate a so-called split-rate tax system, in which buildings and land are taxed separately. Some bias it towards buildings and others towards land. The evidence is that the more it is biased towards land, the more this benefits the local economy – which is what would be predicted by the theory of land value tax – because the more that land is taxed the more this provides an incentive to invest capital on the land in the form of buildings and other economic activities. That is precisely what happened in Harrisburg after the city authorities more than doubled the tax rate on land, while reducing the rate on buildings, such that the rate for land was three times that for buildings.

    In 1982, before the change, Harrisburg, with a population of 52,000, was listed as the second most run-down city in the US. Since then, following the change, empty sites and buildings have been re-developed, with the number of vacant sites by 2004 down by 85 per cent. The city authorities have issued over 32,000 building permits, representing nearly $4 billion of new investment – nearly 2,000 were issued in 2004 alone. Over 5,000 housing units have been newly constructed or rehabilitated, and the number of businesses has jumped from 1,908 to 8,864, with unemployment down by 19 per cent. Furthermore, crime has fallen by 58 per cent, and the number of fires has been reduced by 76 per cent, which the authorities say is due to more employment opportunities, and the elimination of derelict sites, making vandalism less likely.

    They list 40 other positive benefits, including much improved public amenities. More recently, the bias towards tax on land is now six to one compared with three to one originally. This will likely further enhance the trends from which the city has already benefited. Meanwhile, the heightened economic activity has increased public revenues, not only from land and buildings, but also from other taxes, thus benefiting public services. And it has increased quite dramatically both the value of land and that of buildings, from around $400 million in 1982, in today’s prices, to $1.7 billion now. This has enabled the authorities to reduce the rate of tax on both land and buildings. Not surprisingly, this system of taxation has been politically popular, with Mayor Steven Reed Jr being re-elected continuously since 1982.

    One constraint has been the fact that 47 per cent of the land in Harrisburg is occupied by state, federal, educational and charitable institutions, which, anomalously, are exempt by State law from property taxes. However, some of that lost revenue has been clawed back through charges on water, gas and electricity supplies, which are publicly owned – perhaps another lesson that we can learn from Harrisburg.
    Meanwhile, another city in Pennsylvania, namely Pittsburgh, has gone in the opposite direction with its split-rate tax system. In 2000, it reduced the rate of tax on land to the same lower rate as that for buildings. Voters were persuaded that they would pay less tax. In fact, for most, taxes have increased, because the council has had to raise the tax rate on buildings to make up for the revenue lost through lowering the tax on land. Within just the first two years, it led to new construction falling by 21 per cent, and businesses moving out of town on a regular basis – which, again, is what would be predicted by land tax theory.

    Land Value Taxation made Johannesburg into an African Super-City

    Johannesburg, South Africa has no tax on buildings. The entire property tax is on land. Mason Gaffney, a highly respected land economist and Professor of Economics at UC Riverside, visited Johannesburg. This is what he said about it.
    "The miracle of Johannesburg: Jo-burg is a Bootstrap City. It should have died when its gold mines played out, like a proper mining boomtown; instead it remains as the economic capital of its nation and half a continent.

    "Johannesburg defies most laws of urban economics, e.g. that mines create no great cities. Explainers still site the mines, but its mines have played out; it should now be a ghost town. It has no harbor, no water transportation, nor even any gravity water supply. It is, in fact, on a ridge top, the Rand or "reef," at an elevation of 5,000 ft. Unlike Chicago or Boston, it has no sunburst of rail lines, except perhaps what it has attracted itself. It is "on the main rail line," Explainers say, but so are 1000 miles of other sites. The natural site lacks outstanding amenities, and certainly can't hold a candle to Cape Town. Jo-burg has no governmental economic base. Surrounding farmland is poor. Why Johannesburg? Why is it the largest city, the center of finance, industry, commerce, and international air travel? As a public finance economist I may overvalue incentive taxation, but Jo-burg has it. The property tax is on site value only, and at a high rate: they tell me it is 4%. This is what makes Jo-burg distinctive. Challenge and response: Jo-burg had to do something right in order to survive, and that is what it did. It not only survived, it became and remains Number One. Give me a better explanation and I'll back off. I haven't heard one yet."

    If Jo-Burg can do with any natural waterways, Liverpool can be like Barcelona.
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  2. #62
    Member Peter McGurk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by az_gila View Post
    No, the planners do force people to live in certain locations - in the US it's called Planning and Zoning - I'm sure the UK has a similar law. It's also enforced in the longer term by where, and what type, of infrastructure is built.

    The moral values of Green based on carbon is still up for debate and deserves it's own thread. Note how every solution proposed so far involves taxes flowing the the govt.?

    I'll just leave with this - from a mere 40 years ago, a drop in the time bucket compared to climate predictions
    Zoning laws may dictate what goes where but I suspect nobody in the US (or here) is forcing people to live in any specific zone.

    ***

    I don't think there's any mileage in a further debate on the morality of global warming. This 1975 Newsweek piece seems just a little out of step with the 40 years of research and mapping since. 40 years is a drop in a geological bucket but it's a tremendous amount of science in human terms. Prior to the 70s, the topic was unheard of (or rather restricted to Science 'Fiction'). So this piece is more or less at the start of the discussion. If the shrinking ice caps is not evidence enough...

    And the US in particular has to recognise that they have a per capita carbon footprint several times that of most European countries (last time I looked 800%, yes, eight times that of the UK). Given that the built environment has such a marked effect on our energy consumption (about 50% in creating it and 25% in travelling between various bits of it), that has to be down to both the base climate, space expectations and the resultant energy consumption of individual buildings (bigger/ac controlled buildings) and, the huge distances (from a European perspective) in travelling home to work and the dominance of the motor car.

    Counterbalance that with the power and influence of a dollar-based global oil economy and it's small wonder that the planners who are advocating more compact cities meet with such resistance.

    ***

    You may find this interesting: Guardian: Sustainable Cities (in the US) 2009

    ---------- Post added at 06:05 PM ---------- Previous post was at 05:53 PM ----------



    Quote Originally Posted by Ged View Post
    Perhaps if time limits were put on making places habitable, after all, it's not a million years ago it was a nursery, passing stringent regulations no doubt to be able to be one. After which there would be penalties with the most extreme being a handover to the council as it's they after all who take the criticism of thoroughfares into the city looking grubby and uninviting. Maybe a cpo based on its dilapidated condition then the likes of Maghull developments wouldn't just let them fall down so they can then build anew - without the VAT penalty etc. Look what happened to Jamica House on the corner of Dale st/Vernon st and what also happened not long ago to the oldest property on Dale st on the corner of Cheapside.
    What would a time limit change? If the money's not there, it's not there.

    Maghull Developments or anyone else like them do not sit there with a bag of cash in the bank just so they can leave properties empty. Every empty property they hold is costing them money (down the drain and to the bank) - without income to compensate for it.

    The idea that this is paid for by increased value (land-banking - in Everton...) or a saving on VAT is not sustainable.

    Council do not have the money for CPOs of un-viable properties. And what would it buy them? A pain in the financial neck and complaints from the tax payer (about empty properties and lack of progress such as on the Newheartlands - see above).

    The reason for empty properties is lack of customers to live or work in them and it hurts right where it hurts - in the back pocket. There's no incentive to hang on to empty property here.

    A 'use it or lose it' policy is going to have an opposite effect to that intended. Why would anyone buy an empty property if they're only going to get kicked in the teeth a year down the line when tenants couldn't be found?

    What if anyone inherited an old and tired property from their mum or dad and they could find anyone to take it? Would you give them a penalty for that? The poll tax riots would pale into insignificance.

  3. #63
    Senior Member az_gila's Avatar
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    Zoning laws may dictate what goes where but I suspect nobody in the US (or here) is forcing people to live in any specific zone.



    No, not forcing, but they do restrict where and how...


    ***

    I don't think there's any mileage in a further debate on the morality of global warming. This 1975 Newsweek piece seems just a little out of step with the 40 years of research and mapping since. 40 years is a drop in a geological bucket but it's a tremendous amount of science in human terms. Prior to the 70s, the topic was unheard of (or rather restricted to Science 'Fiction'). So this piece is more or less at the start of the discussion. If the shrinking ice caps is not evidence enough...

    And the US in particular has to recognise that they have a per capita carbon footprint several times that of most European countries (last time I looked 800%, yes, eight times that of the UK). Given that the built environment has such a marked effect on our energy consumption (about 50% in creating it and 25% in travelling between various bits of it), that has to be down to both the base climate, space expectations and the resultant energy consumption of individual buildings (bigger/ac controlled buildings) and, the huge distances (from a European perspective) in travelling home to work and the dominance of the motor car.

    Counterbalance that with the power and influence of a dollar-based global oil economy and it's small wonder that the planners who are advocating more compact cities meet with such resistance.

    I beg to disagree, all you have is article quotes and reports from biased (ie, have an interest in the outcome) sources. As an example, once you create an organization called "Office of Climate Change (OCC)" do you think they will regard anything that might hurt their existance as real?

    As an engineer I have always believed in numbers and actual data, something sorely missing in this debate.

    Given that recent satellite data is more accurate, and also more global, and has been working for 17 years I'll just present this -


  4. #64
    Member Peter McGurk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by az_gila View Post
    No, not forcing, but they do restrict where and how...

    I beg to disagree, all you have is article quotes and reports from biased (ie, have an interest in the outcome) sources. As an example, once you create an organization called "Office of Climate Change (OCC)" do you think they will regard anything that might hurt their existance as real?

    As an engineer I have always believed in numbers and actual data, something sorely missing in this debate.

    Given that recent satellite data is more accurate, and also more global, and has been working for 17 years I'll just present this...
    I'm sure that you can live just where you like, where you can get to work within reach and where you can afford - just like us all.

    ***

    I included an item for interest only. I haven’t provided any material is support of CO2 as a cause of global warming here. To attempt to do so would be unrealistic.

    Nevertheless it would be un-contestable from such evidence that cities and compact cities at that, produce less CO2 emissions per capita and I assume you do not contest it. I also assume that you do not contest whether global warming exists or not.

    However I assume that you do contest that the one causes the other.

    There is of course a wealth of research to the contrary and not just from jumped-up self interest groups (whether OCC is one of them or not)

    ***

    You have presented a graph without explanation of the basis of its derivation with a simple assertion in the legend as proof of that assertion and the ‘numbers and data... sorely missing in this debate’. A suggestion no less biased than any organisation you would condemn just for its name.

    Even so and accepting the graph for the moment, it does indicate a continued increase of both temperature and CO2 levels at the same time although it does indicate a decrease in acceleration of increase in temperature. Perhaps (as is very likely) there is another phenomenon that is not measured, which would account for that slower increase, albeit still an increase. Melting of the ice caps perhaps? But that would be too neat. Perhaps not.

    ***

    In terms of bias however it is interesting to note that those countries with vested interest in the continued reliance on higher energy consumption do tend to stand about-face to those who do not.

    Australia it seems being the one exception - as the worst per capita offender (by dint of climate, distances and low population - perhaps a bit like Arizona) and the one most prepared to do something about it.

  5. #65
    Senior Member az_gila's Avatar
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    Australia it seems being the one exception - as the worst per capita offender (by dint of climate, distances and low population - perhaps a bit like Arizona) and the one most prepared to do something about it.

    ------------------------

    Yes, and another example of data being "corrected" (fudged?) to set up a govt. policy...

    http://wattsupwiththat.com/2009/12/0...t-darwin-zero/

    The debate would be a lot more robust if the data collectors actually released the original data, and told you what corrections were performed and why. As of this time they all regard their data as propretary and won't share what has been done to it - even though most of the data has been collected on govt. money.

    Until the data is open I'm afraid I just can't agree that the "sceince is settled".

    Concensus is not a scientific proof in any field except climateology.

    Next week I'm a judge at the local Southern Arizona Science Fair - I bet none of the kids present concensus as part of their exhibits... The kids know better

    I do apologize for the picture with no details. A more complete version is here -

    http://www.c3headlines.com/2012/01/t...edictions.html

    The better description I still need to find, but was based on past data, IPCC predictions and whether the Earth has a positive or negative feedback to climate forcing functions. The IPCC assumes negative feedback to CO2, but real data shows a positive feedback. This makes a heck of a difference to the 100 years out "we are all in trouble" prediction.

    [Joke]Having spent two winter months over the last two years in Liverpool, I think 1 or 2 degrees C rise might actually be good - heck it would even reduce CO2 generation due to smaller heating bills... [/Joke]

  6. #66
    Member Peter McGurk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by az_gila View Post
    Yes, and another example of data being "corrected" (fudged?) to set up a govt. policy...

    The debate would be a lot more robust if the data collectors actually released the original data, and told you what corrections were performed and why.

    Concensus is not a scientific proof in any field except climateology.

    Next week I'm a judge at the local Southern Arizona Science Fair - I bet none of the kids present concensus as part of their exhibits...

    [Joke]Having spent two winter months over the last two years in Liverpool, I think 1 or 2 degrees C rise might actually be good - heck it would even reduce CO2 generation due to smaller heating bills... [/Joke]
    I’m sorry I’ve (scan)-read the links three times and see no mention of consensus. So I do not follow the reference.

    Similarly I don’t know the authors of the pieces or their qualifications to interpret either the base data or the adjustments.

    I do know that a ‘full disclosure’ of the raw data to the uninitiated or poorly qualified could be like asking a plumber to explain the full and detailed workings of the Hadron collider.

    And I would hope that the kids at the Science Fair are aware that there is no ‘proof’ in science. Science moves forward based on hypothesis and probable explanation. The scientific community is its own forum within which certain explanations gained more or less credence as time goes by.

    Explanation previously held as true becomes superseded by newer truths (from Newton to Einstein to Pauli). Perhaps not consensus but near enough to it as makes no difference.

    I can remember year after year winter snow in Liverpool. I went to a wedding in Zurich in December about two years ago - not one flake, in the sky or on the ground.

    ***

    As for one or two degrees being good, tell it to the birds - literally, the ones dying out because spring is coming too early and insect larvae are peaking too soon to feed the chicks. Not a joke.

    Or if you don't believe CO2 emissions are the cause, you can laugh about it with those affected by lack of water availability, flood risk, rising sea levels, storms and disease transference.

  7. #67
    Senior Member az_gila's Avatar
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    I’m sorry I’ve (scan)-read the links three times and see no mention of consensus. So I do not follow the reference.

    My mistake. Consensus is the word used to denigrate the "deniers" when they ask for any proof. In this case proof would be accuracy of the predictive models.
    It's the term used by politicians given no scientific accuracy. One minor example here -

    http://www.sciencemag.org/content/306/5702/1686.full

    Given that the models are now many years old you would think that their predictions could be checked - no examples have been shown of this yet.


    Similarly I don’t know the authors of the pieces or their qualifications to interpret either the base data or the adjustments.

    I do know that a ‘full disclosure’ of the raw data to the uninitiated or poorly qualified could be like asking a plumber to explain the full and detailed workings of the Hadron collider.

    Doesn't matter, they are not releasing their data to anyone, even those qualified to review.

    Even then, with a reasonable explanation, as a graduate Liverpool Univ. engineer, I should probably be able to follow the workings of the Hadron collider. The simple plumber explanation should also fit in with the engineer explanation - right now it's over-simplified (and alarmist) and is not fully connected to all of the available data.

    And I would hope that the kids at the Science Fair are aware that there is no ‘proof’ in science. Science moves forward based on hypothesis and probable explanation. The scientific community is its own forum within which certain explanations gained more or less credence as time goes by.

    I agree 'no proof', but theories are put out, along with observed data, and others review them. That is the way in all other scientific fields. The "climategate" e-mails showed how IPCC authors wanted a scientific journal editor removed becuase he dared to publish a paper from a qualified author that they disagreed with. The AGW community is not playing straight here...

    Explanation previously held as true becomes superseded by newer truths (from Newton to Einstein to Pauli). Perhaps not consensus but near enough to it as makes no difference.

    True, but with data and observations to back it up. All of the AGW is based on predictive models, and not one has really been checked - often the model internals are not even released to others inthe scientific community.

    http://www.appinsys.com/GlobalWarming/IPCC1995_Fail.htm


    I can remember year after year winter snow in Liverpool. I went to a wedding in Zurich in December about two years ago - not one flake, in the sky or on the ground.

    Interesting, I cycled 2.5 miles four times a day to Quarry Bank HS in the early 60's and remember very few days when I couldn't go. My dad didn't have a car and the bus routes sucked so I would have walked, and remembered it. Last year in Feb. in Liverpool there were a few days when I couldn't even walk around the block to my sisters because of the ice. When I was a teenager I had a nice tobaggon given to me. I can only remember one period of 3 days or so when Holts field was covered well enough in snow to use it. In the last two trips to Liverpool in the last three years I saw more snow on Holts field than that.

    In the climate world our personal recollections don't cover enough time span and are not uniform. Our minds cherry-pick the data.

    Your Zurich trip isn't a good example either, you could have gone to Venice this winter and seen the canals frozen over for the first time in several decades...

    ***

    As for one or two degrees being good, tell it to the birds - literally, the ones dying out because spring is coming too early and insect larvae are peaking too soon to feed the chicks. Not a joke.

    Again, surveys by scientists to get AGW grants. Most of what you quoted is based on predictions from the IPCC worst cases. It tries to make a good case for govt. intervention.

    Or if you don't believe CO2 emissions are the cause, you can laugh about it with those affected by lack of water availability, flood risk, rising sea levels, storms and disease transference.

    Again, based on the trend. Global Warming just got renamed in the last year to Climate Change - now everything can be blamed on CO2, hot/cold, wet/dry it's all our fault. What should the sea level be? Even the US can't come up with more than 6 inches in a century. Not cherry picking data, which the alarmist newspapers usually do, this is by where I lived in CA - Arizona doesn't have a sea level problem unless CA gets a giant earthquake...

    http://tidesandcurrents.noaa.gov/slt...?stnid=9410840

    At less than 1/16 inch per year even the accuracy could be called into question....

    If the alarmists call for more storms in the US, then we may have more water available. I'm not arguing against conservation, I don't think we should waste stuff, but I see attempts at recycling and saving energy that make folks feel good, but actually use more energy overall.

    Solar panels are one - sounds like free electricity from the sun, but how much energy went into making them? Prices have fallen in the US, but it's distorted due to cheap Chinese panel imports - made with probably the dirtiest energy on the planet.

    In a similar vein, what should the temperature of the planet be? What is good and what is bad? Things change on their own - England grew grapes outdoors in Medieval times - Greenland was settled and farmed at one time. In climate timelines these were recent events, especially since the IPCC is predicting temperatures a century out.

    Note that every "solution" proposed so far involves the taking of money from your pocket and giving to the govt....

    UPDATE

    I found the good description of feedback and model accuracy I mentioned earlier, and it even comes from an ex-Australian govt. scientist. He was in the Australian Greenhouse Office (now the Department of Climate Change) - Hey, there's that name change I mentioned earlier! Note that since he looked at more data and changed his stance, he is now ex-govt....

    http://mises.org/daily/5892/The-Skeptics-Case

    It's the best clear explanation of feedbacks within climate systems I have come across. Even the plumber mentioned above could probably follow it. It even follows the scientific method that the kids could understand - make a prediction (theory), take the data, and then check if your prediction (theory) was true.

    The summary is here - my highlight -

    "The data presented here is impeccably sourced, very relevant, publicly available, and from our best instruments. Yet it never appears in the mainstream media — have you ever seen anything like any of the figures here in the mainstream media? That alone tells you that the "debate" is about politics and power, and not about science or truth.

    This is an unusual political issue, because there is a right and a wrong answer, and everyone will know which it is eventually. People are going ahead and emitting CO2 anyway, so we are doing the experiment: either the world heats up by several degrees by 2050 or so, or it doesn't.

    Notice that the skeptics agree with the government climate scientists about the direct effect of CO2; they just disagree about the feedbacks. The climate debate is all about the feedbacks; everything else is merely a sideshow. Yet hardly anyone knows that. The government climate scientists and the mainstream media have framed the debate in terms of the direct effect of CO2 and sideshows such as arctic ice, bad weather, or psychology."

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    Re-member Ged's Avatar
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    A time scale on having to do something with a property somebody willingly and voluntarily bought would of course have an effect on making the new owner do something with it or why buy it in the first place if not just to let the land value increase as it will over time anyway - or perhaps the land will increase solely because of other developments and activity around it - like we saw with the King Edward pub site.

    The building I had in mind was obviously habitable not too long ago - the late 80s early 90s as I remember. Even if it is owned by the Council, though they were very cagey with me, then it's a disgrace that it's been left to go to ruin like that and not at least put out on the open market for sale. One way or another, whether it is privately owned or council, the scenario which has happened up to now (saving it falling down or being demolished) is the worst that could have happened up to now and that's not acceptable.

    Inheriting something somebody doesn't want is easily solved by selling it if it's not wanted, hasn't that always been the case, even if it's something rather than nothing. Perhaps inheriting something that's been bestowed upon you unwillingly is a different kettle of fish that actually going out of your way to own something which then becomes a blot on the landscape impacting upon others due to your negligence - just as the council do not allow residential tenants to overgrow their gardens out of control - at least that is the law - whether it's enforced often enough is another matter.
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    Member Peter McGurk's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by az_gila View Post
    Doesn't matter, they are not releasing their data to anyone, even those qualified to review.
    The ‘business’ of science of every description is about finding funding/grants for research. That is no reason to discriminate against any particular group and particularly not on the basis that you happen to disagree with that group.

    As for us all paying (via government or not) well, we’ve all enjoyed the tune. Maybe it’s time to pay the piper.

    ***

    Concentration on looking forward alone (predictive models) rather than looking at what has happened (historic correlations) is highly selective and by no means the full story. It does however pre-suppose that a link has been established between cause (CO2 emissions) and effect (global warming/ climate change).

    That link is supported by IPCC to the point of accepted wisdom (consensus) and at least backed by the 928 scientific theses referenced (in that particular report).

    There is also science to hypothesise and observe the results of the resultant warming.

    Actual sea level increase, real melting of the ice caps, green Alps in December, no sparrows in my mum’s back garden in Huyton. Bloody Magpies everywhere - all of which are demonstrably happening.

    Note. These are not predictive and do not call on predictive research as proof of the pudding. The pudding is actually happening. Even the graph you cite shows an increase in sea level. It is happening!

    ***

    Yes, some of that is discountable as short-term personal experience and yes, there is contrary experience - but as I said, who’s to say that the slowing of the warming (or snow and ice in Liverpool last year) is not down to the melting of the ice caps or reversal of the gulf stream or some other unmeasured phenomena. The systems are complex.

    And so and as for checking predictive models, we’ve been trying to predict weather for as long as... and with just about as much success. Frankly I think it’s entirely reasonable for the IPCC not to make such an important debate such a hostage to such a fragile fortune.

    ***

    Some of the observed phenomena may well be headline catching but headline catching is what you have to do to get a message over. A number of Science (Non-)Fictionists (Arthur C Clarke, Asimov) have put the basis of the science forward for many years prior to the 1970s in rather more scientific terms than the genre suggests. They've been followed by more pointed commentators such as James Lovelock and others. And for just as many years they have been dismissed as Science Fantasists or Loony Lefties with an axe to grind against capitalist society. (If that's not vested and self-interest and bias, I don't know what is).

    But you need to make waves to get the message through even to the petrol heads who have a strong vested interest in keeping on, keeping on (Jeremy Clarkson, any Texan...). Unfortunate as it is, we live in a world of sound-bites.

    ***

    Well, I have a degree too and a post-graduate qualification and letters up the ying-yang after my name and I could probably have a better than average go at explaining the workings of the Hadron collider.

    Nevertheless, I am still not qualified to address the raw data and as an engineer - structural, civil, mechanical or electrical, neither are you. We are all guilty of living in a world of half-baked and ill-informed opinion - about almost everything. We need not swallow 'expert' opinion wholesale but we could all do with being a bit more humble.

    ***

    That said, I’ve also been working in the built environment for nearly forty years and on what I do know about, in some depth - the effects of global warming are very clearly marked.

    Buildings are more complicated. They cost more to build and are thus becoming smaller and even so, less affordable. They cost more to heat (largely because of ‘urban sprawl’ and extended distribution) and more to cool (because of increased temperatures).

    Quality of Life is falling because of global warming. You may argue in the face of ‘consensus’ that that is not as a result of CO2 emissions and that ‘the experiment is running’ - well, I for one would rather not wait till we pass a tipping point beyond which there is no redress. I would rather not risk runaway global heating because we no longer have ice caps to reflect solar radiation.

    ***

    We could do nothing. The planet is self-regulatory. Perhaps vines would grow in Greenland again. Maybe wheat on the tundra. Life would adapt and move on. But I would rather keep sea temperatures at levels that can absorb CO2 as they have done for millennia. I would rather the planet maintained a balance for life that includes, rather than excludes, us.

    I would rather run the other experiment. The other experiment of reducing CO2 emissions and seeing what happens with that.

    ***

    Because and like your planners in Tucson, I know that besides everything else, bringing people closer together (less travel) in more ‘passively’ engineered environments has positive benefits in any event, not only to lifestyle, social interaction, well-being and reduction of stress but also to the reduction of carbon emissions and other industrial pollutants in the atmosphere (and there is a moral imperative for that).

    For example, I wonder if anyone has correlated the plume from the refineries at Ellemere Port and the incidences of carcinogenic and respiratory disease in Liverpool recently?



    ---------- Post added at 11:51 AM ---------- Previous post was at 11:23 AM ----------

    Quote Originally Posted by Ged View Post
    A time scale on having to do something with a property somebody willingly and voluntarily bought would of course have an effect on making the new owner do something with it or why buy it in the first place if not just to let the land value increase as it will over time anyway - or perhaps the land will increase solely because of other developments and activity around it - like we saw with the King Edward pub site.

    The building I had in mind was obviously habitable not too long ago - the late 80s early 90s as I remember. Even if it is owned by the Council, though they were very cagey with me, then it's a disgrace that it's been left to go to ruin like that and not at least put out on the open market for sale. One way or another, whether it is privately owned or council, the scenario which has happened up to now (saving it falling down or being demolished) is the worst that could have happened up to now and that's not acceptable.

    Inheriting something somebody doesn't want is easily solved by selling it if it's not wanted, hasn't that always been the case, even if it's something rather than nothing. Perhaps inheriting something that's been bestowed upon you unwillingly is a different kettle of fish that actually going out of your way to own something which then becomes a blot on the landscape impacting upon others due to your negligence - just as the council do not allow residential tenants to overgrow their gardens out of control - at least that is the law - whether it's enforced often enough is another matter.
    Ged, I’m sorry but I don’t think you’re getting my point.

    If nobody wants to buy a place or they haven’t got the money to do it up themselves or no-one is interesting in living or working there, there’s nothing anyone can do to change that (whether it’s owned by the council or not).

    You can’t 'easily solve' the situation if no-one wants to buy it or live in it. You’re stuck with it and if you’ve just bought it (or inherited it), it hurts.

    ***

    King Eddies fell into disrepair because no-one wanted to go to a pub there - out on a limb. No houses around. Dock Road businesses closed. Difficult road to cross for lunch time trade (who were better off in the Cross Keys). The owner was stuck with it. Why should he spend money on it?

    Along comes the expansion of the Business District and the owner says “I’ll have a bit of that” and sells it to a developer who puts in for planning permission at his own expense and risk.

    Along comes a recession and back to square one (almost) - no one wants it again. Unless the developer bought it ‘subject to’ he’ll be hurting like stink right now. What was the price? £8m? £25m plus planning costs? 6% to 12% at the bank? ouch.

    ***

    On the one hand and with the best will in the world, the buyer thought he had a go-er and put his money where his mouth was. Now he's stuck with a massive interest bill.

    On the other and if the sale didn't happen, should the owner be penalised because it fell through any more than the son fined because no-one wants his dad's house?

  10. #70
    Senior Member Waterways's Avatar
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ged View Post
    A time scale on having to do something with a property somebody willingly and voluntarily bought would of course have an effect on making the new owner do something with it or why buy it in the first place if not just to let the land value increase as it will over time anyway - or perhaps the land will increase solely because of other developments and activity around it - like we saw with the King Edward pub site.
    Ged, read my recent posts. Look at Land Valuation Taxation and Harrisburg in the USA. Harrisburg was in the same situation as Liverpool and dragged itself up by using intelligence and a system that works and proven to work. Derelict buildings were cleared up. The city prospered. LVT made Jo-Burg the economic super-city of half a continent - they introduced it in the city in 1918. There is no reason why Jo-Burg should be success in the location it is in once the mines were worked dry. The city is not on a river, a confluence of fertile valleys, on a lake and it is surrounded by poor farmland. I went to Jo-Burg about 16 years ago and the city was clearly prosperous. I saw no derelict buildings and the homes built were far larger than those in Cape Town - all due to a simple tax. No change of business laws or anything like that in Jo-Burg or Harrisburg.

    Then there is the brilliant success of Taiwan.
    The German colony of Kiaochow in China, established in 1898, had a Single Tax on land value, no other taxes, set at 6 percent. Its principal city, Tsing-tao, developed into a fine modern city. The Germans lost the colony in 1914 at the outbreak of World War I, but the experience of the colony influenced the Chinese revolutionary Sun Yat-sen, who became head of the government of China. He and his successors in the Nationalist Party were not able to implement land value taxation in that country, but when they moved to Taiwan in 1950 after the communists took control of the mainland, Chiang-kai shek implemented a land-to-the-tiller reform accompanied by a tax on land value. Taiwan has since developed into an advanced major industrial power from an agricultural backwater in a short timeframe. Hong Kong and Singapore became major commercial centers in large part because much of their public finance is based on taxing land values, or in the case of Hong Kong, from selling land leases, with low taxes on trade and commerce.

    Liverpool has everything going for it. It is: on a wide deep water estuary, an in-place super large port, its own airport with easy access to another, the geographical centre of the UK, countless towns and cities within a few hours drive, established in-place rail and motorway infrastructure, etc, etc. Then why has the city struggled so much, blighted by abandoned buildings? That is a question with a complex answer, however, the solution is staring the city in the face. Some have seen it and attempted to get LVT implemented in the city. Whitehall officials came up and sent the US advisors from The Center for the Study of Economics packing. We should be campaigning to get the city more in control of its own financial affairs, and get rid of the dead paw of London.
    The new Amsterdam at Liverpool?
    Save Liverpool Docks and Waterways - Click

    Deprived of its unique dockland waters Liverpool
    becomes a Venice without canals, just another city, no
    longer of special interest to anyone, least of all the
    tourist. Would we visit a modernised Venice of filled in
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    how it once was?


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    Quote Originally Posted by Peter McGurk View Post
    Some of the observed phenomena may well be headline catching but headline catching is what you have to do to get a message over. A number of Science (Non-)Fictionists (Arthur C Clarke, Asimov) have put the basis of the science forward for many years prior to the 1970s in rather more scientific terms than the genre suggests. They've been followed by more pointed commentators such as James Lovelock and others. And for just as many years they have been dismissed as Science Fantasists or Loony Lefties with an axe to grind against capitalist society. (If that's not vested and self-interest and bias, I don't know what is).
    James Lovelock discovered the atmosphere of Mars for NASA and then looked at the Earth forming the Gaia theory. The earth is all one system that makes it unique. The oceasn, land and and air all interact and create a self controlling system. That is severely being damaged.
    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gaia_hypothesis

    Lovelock rightly says there is nothing wrong with nuclear. Radiation is a part of our makeup. He says the earth is a full system where the sea, atmosphere and land all combines to form a self controlling atmosphere which makes the earth different to all other planets. It is being destroyed by fossil fuel burning.

    He points out Chernobyl has an off limits area to humans, but animals are flurishing in the radioactive area and flora and fauna is booming. Radiation helps growth with some plants twice to three as big as before. He said there are far more animals - OK they may live 10% less because of higher than normal radiation levels but there are far, far more of them. Because of this he advocates using the rainforests as a place to store spent nuclear fuel. Humans are away and the forests boom reinstating the earth's lungs and wildlife as well. Two birds killed with one stone.

    Lovelock points out that air travel is safe because of international regulations and inspection of plane construction, maintenance and procedures. That can be done with nuclear power stations. Chernobyl failed because of human error and other aspects were not that bright inthe design. International regulations would prevent this from occuring.

    The newer Japanese nuclear plant in the eathquake, has two or three outer shells - an explosion was contained. We know more now since the Windscale and Chernobyl disasters. All nuclear power stations should be under an international ruling and international inspectors to ensure procedures and construction and maintenance is up to standards - like bridges are periodically surveyed. The likes of the Japanese plant would never have been built on the coast in a tidal-wave zone.

    We have no other choice over using fossil fuel as wind, solar etc cannot cope with all demand. Cars, buses, trains, domestic heating, small planes etc, will be electric. Nuclear is the short to mid term answer until we come up with a better way of harnessing energy. China is opening a power station per week - all coal burning. It is that serious. Only international cooperation will save us from our own greed and stupidity.



    All will be clean electric.
    300 Years of FOSSIL FUELS in 300 Seconds....
    The new Amsterdam at Liverpool?
    Save Liverpool Docks and Waterways - Click

    Deprived of its unique dockland waters Liverpool
    becomes a Venice without canals, just another city, no
    longer of special interest to anyone, least of all the
    tourist. Would we visit a modernised Venice of filled in
    canals to view its modern museum describing
    how it once was?


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    Peter. People are interested in living in a fantastic Georgian property overlooking the city from on high IF the owner does it up and rents them which he should be made to do or forfeit the property or start charging him full council tax on it. It should not be left a blight on the landscape. It's an easy way out for landlords to do nothing. Do you think the company renovating St Andrews church are doing it without planning, speculating, feasibility studies into the market they're going into etc?
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  13. #73
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    Quote Originally Posted by Ged View Post
    Peter. People are interested in living in a fantastic Georgian property overlooking the city from on high IF the owner does it up and rents them which he should be made to do or forfeit the property or start charging him full council tax on it. It should not be left a blight on the landscape. It's an easy way out for landlords to do nothing. Do you think the company renovating St Andrews church are doing it without planning, speculating, feasibility studies into the market they're going into etc?
    Of course they are interested but at what price? If it costs more to do up than people can pay to live in it, what then? Should he forfeit the property because it's a millstone round his neck (and would be a millstone around anyone else's neck)? Should he pay in full for services he's not using?

    Money doesn't fall from the sky nor can you assume just because someone owns a property they've got bags of money to throw away on it.

    Put yourself in his shoes. You own a property that's not viable and council send you a demand to spend more than you've got or can afford on it or they'll take it off you. You say no and they still want a bill for police, road lighting, drainage and environmental services that you're not using. This is grossly unfair.

    Worse yet if you paid for it and have to carry on with the mortgage without getting any money in.

    And the long term result would be that no-one would buy a property unless they had a contract in blood from the end-user to occupy it for the rent and time needed or the price required, to cover the costs in full and without risk and with clauses in a contract to cover increases in interest rates and other unforeseen costs such as increases in council tax.

    Without all that anyone could lose everything they put into it. It is unworkable and would produce exactly the reverse of that intended - acres of redundant property that no-one would dare buy.

    ***

    As far as I know the Scottish Church is owned by JMU who thus far have not been able to make a move on it (although they haven't had it that long). I don't what the problem might have been (the cemetery and that famous grave perhaps?).

    For sure they have been working on the problem and have clearly found a viable use for the building or even a buyer to take it off their hands - all power to their elbow. That said it is in Rodney Street - an entirely different kettle of fish to Everton.

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    Anyone into property development and knowing what can be charged for accommodation know it never costs more to do up property that is habitable. The problem now with that property is that it has become too big a job and whose fault is that?

    Matchboxes have been built from scratch on Daulby street, i've been in them. Big houses all over the city have been converted into multi use/co-habitation - very few larger houses are now single occupancy. Not only is it not fair that the council cannot reap in council tax on properties left like this but it is unfair on owners, let say of the Georgian property just a little along the road from this on the opposite side which manages quite well in the same area.
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    Peter, I could disagree with just about every paragraph you wrote, but this is going so far off topic I'll stop with just a few observations.

    The "consensus" or "proven science" is not as proven as you might guess from newspaper reports. And these are qualified scientists, not plumbers.

    http://www.petitionproject.org/

    We need not swallow 'expert' opinion wholesale but we could all do with being a bit more humble.

    An e-mail quote from one of the "expert scientists" you mention -

    Tim Osborne #2347
    Also, we set all post-1960 values to missing in the MXD
    data set (due to decline), and the method will infill these, estimating them from the real temperatures – another way of “correcting” for the decline, though may be not defensible!


    And the social comment is interesting...

    Because and like your planners in Tucson, I know that besides everything else, bringing people closer together (less travel) in more ‘passively’ engineered environments has positive benefits in any event, not only to lifestyle, social interaction, well-being and reduction of stress but also to the reduction of carbon emissions and other industrial pollutants in the atmosphere (and there is a moral imperative for that).

    I think crime statistics of inner cites and denser neighbourhoods say that stress and bad interaction also come into play. Your assumption of positive is not shared by many. Have you tried living on many acres in a rural setting surrounded by mountains, wildlife and seeing whether your stress level goes up or down?...

    I am for the reduction of pollutants, but CO2 is natural and has been in the atmosphere for ever.


    A new thread is needed if this continues...

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