AN IDIOTIC "GREEN" BRIDGE



Rationality is in short supply in anything Greenies touch and the new "Green" bridge over the river in Brisbane (Queensland, Australia) is no exception. It has a cycle path, a pedestrian path and two road lanes that mostly empty buses trundle over but the road lanes are not open to cars. It is an anti-car bridge! Since there is little additional car-parking close to the bridge, it seems unlikely to be much used -- despite its cost to the taxpayer of $54 million.

The idiocies do not end there, however. It does not encourage pedestrians either. Have a look at the photo above and note the partial awning over the pedestrian path. It is situated on the South of the path but Brisbane is South of the tropic of Capricorn so the sun always comes from the North. So the awning is totally useless as a sunshade. And you can see that it is little use as a rain-shelter either. Someone must not have told the architect that the rain rarely falls straight down!

My previous post about the bridge was on December 17th (scroll down).




POLAR BEARS: BUSH ADMIN THROWS THE GREENIES A CRUMB



Polar bears might be facing extinction and should be on the US endangered species list, the Bush administration said today, in a move that could see a change in US attitudes on global warming. Listing the bears as threatened would force US government agencies to ensure they in no way jeopardised the animal's existence. That in turn could pressure the Government to consider tougher measures to clean up the air because most scientists believe carbon dioxide emissions cause global warming.

"Today the Interior Department's US Fish and Wildlife Service is proposing to list polar bears as a threatened species under the Endangered Species Act," said interior secretary Dirk Kempthorne. "We are making this proposal because a scientific review of the species by the Fish and Wildlife service found that populations may be threatened by receding sea ice, which polar bears use as a platform for many activities essential to their life cycle, including hunting for their main prey, Arctic seals."

Today's announcement follows a campaign by environmental groups, which sued the Government seeking action to protect the polar bear.

There will now be a period of public comment and scientific review before a final decision in 12 months over whether to list the polar bear as threatened. The only wild polar bears in the US live in Alaska. Andrew Wetzler, a senior attorney with the Natural Resources Defence Council, one of the groups that sued the Government, said: "Global warming is the single biggest threat to polar bears' survival, and this will require the Government to address the impacts on the polar bear."...

There are 20,000 to 25,000 polar bears alive today. A Canadian group of polar bears, one of the most widely studied, has seen a substantial decline in recent years, but officials said today that the Alaskan polar bears had not suffered a statistically significant decline.

Source. See what the polar bear experts say about polar bear numbers here




A PUBLIC DEBATE AT LAST?

Below is an open letter from Neil Craig, of Scotland's 9% growth political party:

The Boss of the National Environment Research Council, Alan Thorpe has called for an open public & online debate to disprove the position of sceptics on warming. That is a very welcome development when one bears in mind that such scientific luminaries as a former Moderator of the Church of Scotland have spoken against allowing debate, becvause the scientific case is "settled". One might even hope that this debate might be hosted by the BBC. By recently hiring David Attenborough to assure us that, such is the current sea rise, that in 20 years much of Norfolk will be underwater yet refusing airtime to scientists who are actually measuring it & could say that this is, quite decidedly not so, the BBC has strayed from impartiality. Hosting an open debate would, if not remove the appearance of propagandising from the allegation (assuming Norfolk doesn't sink by 2026), at least dilute it.

Mr Thorpe's Council however, being committed to "impartial environmental research" (it says so on their website) is clearly in a position to put the catastrophe enthusiast's position robustly. The site does not explain how it receives funding - presumably not from oil companies or organisations committed to a belief in warming either, or how it ensures, when awarding grants, that it maintains an impartial balance in research.

According to the story repeated almost verbatim in a number of papers he believes that the computer models on the enthusiast's side have been consistently proven correct. I would be very interested in reading his explanation of how the Hockey Stick theory which predicted a continuous fast rise since the 1990s has been proven accurate by current figures showing temperature has been lower than that of 1998 for 5 of the succeeding years. He would probably also be able to explain how it was that the Hockey Stick computer programme, the pride of the IPCC's report was, when tested by Stephen McIntyre, able to produce exactly the same warming prediction virtually whatever figures were put into it.

Having myself contributed to this debate in the letters column & online in the "Scotsman" (the online comments, which are not selected by staff, have been overwhelmingly of the sceptical view) I look forward, with some enthusiasm, to see whether Mr Thorpe's "impartial" future contributions, so heavily trailed, prove convincing. Let us see if the media will permit a debate with 2 sides.

In his online version of the above letter, Neil unleashes at the end a bit of good Scottish skepticism in the words "I hae ma douts". People sometimes surprise me by how poorly they understand Scots, so perhaps I should add that the words translate as "I have my doubts"




Global cooling in Queensland

If an unusually hot summer in London proves global warming, surely an unusually cool summer in Brisbane proves global cooling!! Or don't the colonies count?

It still hasn't broken the drought, but more good soaking rain across much of the state yesterday seemed to wash away our concerns - at least for a moment or two. As a southerly air stream brought more record cold December temperatures and unseasonal drizzle, many swapped the traditional post-Christmas day at the beach for a rare stroll in the rain....

There were smiles too on the Darling Downs, where the light drizzle was just enough follow-up to storm rain a fortnight ago. Graingrower Frank Stenzel said the 8mm of light rain that had fallen since Christmas Day at his Greenmount property, 25km south of Toowoomba, was a welcome boost for his 120ha crop of sorghum. But Mr Stenzel said he would need a further 100mm in coming weeks to ensure a reasonable harvest. "The cool weather has allowed the rain to soak in and hopefully well get more by the weekend," he said.

The bureau has forecast cloudy skies and patchy rain for today in a band from the northwest to the southeast of the state, slowly clearing northwards. Tomorrow, rain is expected to ease and clear northwards, with temperatures climbing but still generally below average. The highest rainfall recorded yesterday was 29mm at Baralaba, 200km southwest of Gladstone.

Bureau senior forecaster Geoff Doueal said record low December maximums had been recorded at several places, including Brisbane Airport (19.1C), Toowoomba (13.9C), Ipswich (18.4C) and Oakey (15.5C). Emerald's maximum of 16.7C was the lowest December maximum for a century. The previous lowest December temperature was 18.3 in 1907.

More here

And it is indeed a remarkably cool summer here in Brisbane. There is a distinct nip in the air at night. Usually, at this time of the year, I am accustomed to having a warm shower by turning on the cold water only!

***************************************

Many people would like to be kind to others so Leftists exploit that with their nonsense about equality. Most people want a clean, green environment so Greenies exploit that by inventing all sorts of far-fetched threats to the environment. But for both, the real motive is generally to promote themselves as wiser and better than everyone else, truth regardless.

Global warming has taken the place of Communism as an absurdity that "liberals" will defend to the death regardless of the evidence showing its folly. Evidence never has mattered to real Leftists

Comments? Email me here. My Home Pages are here or here or here. For times when blogger.com is playing up, there are mirrors of this site here and here.

*****************************************