Has Anyone Thought of Creating a Protected Marina in the Ocean?

[boatman61]

Originally Posted by ryon

About ten years ago, I helped a guy build a floating island out of trash.

I've been back a couple of times since, and he's been living on it happily, oblivious to the internet experts.

We seem to have a lot of experts here as well, so I propose that we break this into two groups. One that knows how things should be done, and another for the people who want to go out and build this thing!

So your the creator of the Pacific Trash Heap...

[hpeer]

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

Quote: "OK, here's an outside the box idea......how's about we REDUCE THE POPULATION?"

Usta have that conversation with my Business and Society stoodes 40 years ago - many of them "Visa Students" from "South East Asia" Do the math as to what had just happened in their world back then.

Three scenarios:

1) Trust to a natural disaster. At least that is "value neutral", but HIV didn't cut it, Ebola didn't cut it, and I doubt that Zika will cut it, so that leaves us two options:

2) Give a war. 40 years ago we'd just tried that (again!) and we are still trying it, and we STILL find that little men in black PJs or white shalwar kameez will run the "Finest Military Force The World Has Ever Seen" into the sea (again and again!).

3) Call for volunteers. There wasn't a whole helluvalot of enthusiasm for that idea either in among my students of in the last place it was tried. The nation that then (ca. 1942) saw itself as "Finest Military Force The World Has Ever Seen" found that to make any headway at all, it had to "volunteer" you, you and you! We are still living with the consequences of that!

Maybe we'd better cycle back to Option 1! Global Warming anyone :-)?

TrentePieds

That's about the way I see it, we are circling back to #1. Short of a big meteor hit or nuclear war (India-Pack) we will eventually "improve" ourselves into catastrophe. When some criticalresource gets tight the global financial markets will freeze restricting trade. All it takes is trust in the system to falter.

Because our food supplies are now so highly mechanized a reduction in their trade will cause famines, which will cause war and more famine, etc. How hard you are hit how soon will vary in unpredictable ways. The start of said fiasco is also unpredictable. Smoke em while you've got em.

[first wind]

Originally Posted by boatman61

Originally Posted by Skeezix View Post


In the past year it was discovered Antarctic ice is melting ten times faster than previously thought. There is enough ice on that continent to raise global ocean levels four feet. The OP's quest for additional moorings might be as close as shopping mall parking lots.



As always.. Mans Ego merely serves to Illustrate his boundless Ignorance..

what i find interesting is that, despite the fact that there have been lots of climatic changes on this planet( from being a ball of frozen ice to a true hot house and everything in between) since the very beginning of the planet's existence...most of them happening long ages before talking monkeys were anywhere near evolving, people will readily buy the idea that the earth's climate is historically unchanging and that any supposed climate change we are experiencing just has to be caused by humans and yet...

no one seems to realize that the earth is a finite space and that humans can't just reproduce exponentially for eternity without running out of space. no one seems to get that you can't plow down every bit of natural earth to make human habitation and still have the planet be habitable.

no one seems to realize that animals at the top of the food chain are small in population compared to the other forms of life that support that food chain for them to be at the top of....and that humans are at the very top of the food chain. what should that tell you about our population? but, it doesn't.

when disposing of any animal's crap and urine, without devastating the surrounding environment, becomes a huge engineering effort, that animal is overpopulated....oh, except us. sorry, i forgot.

yet, if you even mention overpopulation people will go out of their way to let you know there can never be such a thing. we can keep populating like this forever. it's like you took a dump on the sacred cow...too many of us? are you mad? there can never be too many of us.

you know, i was just reading an article in scientific american about fukushima japan, where the tsunami caused the worst nuclear disaster since chernobyl. the article said that the site is still generating hundreds of thousands of tons of nuclear waste a day. they still don't know what to do with it all. it's finding it's way to the ocean. the area is still uninhabitable. cancer rates in kids living there at the time of the incident (kids that were evacuated) are extremely high.

at the time, as any rational people would do, they took all the other nuclear plants off-line. but, now, with all the above nastiness still being caused by fukushima, japan's government if fully recommitting to nuclear power. two plants are already back up and running....

and all the people who swear we are not overpopulated say we just need to stop using fossil fuels and use something cleaner and more environmentally friendly...something like nuclear power.

it is to laugh. we are a species of madmen. we really do deserve everything we have coming to us. it's too bad we will cause so much death and suffering to all the other life on the planet, in the process.

reminds me of a song:


"Angels on the sideline,
Puzzled and amused.
Why did Father give these humans free will?
Now they're all confused....



Angels on the sideline,
Baffled and confused.
Father blessed them all with reason.
And this is what they choose...

How they survive so misguided is a mystery.....

Repugnant is a creature who would squander the ability to lift an eye to heaven conscious of his fleeting time here...."


-from "right in two" by Tool

[eieblen]

In Idaho we argue about 700 wolves and have about a million people. Which population needs to be controlled?

[TrentePieds]

Quote: "That's about the way I see it, we are circling back to #1. Short of a big meteor hit or nuclear war (India-Pack) we will eventually "improve" ourselves into catastrophe. When some critical resource gets tight the global financial markets will freeze restricting trade. All it takes is trust in the system to falter.

Because our food supplies are now so highly mechanized a reduction in their trade will cause famines, which will cause war and more famine, etc. How hard you are hit how soon will vary in unpredictable ways. The start of said fiasco is also unpredictable. Smoke em while you've got em."



Well — No. The "start" is already upon us. What do you think Syria is all about? Greece? "Brexit"? Paris? Brussels? The "real problem" is that there are NO solutions that anyone in Western Society ("The Finest Military Force the World has Ever Seen") is willing to implement. Would YOU be willing to hit the Big Red Button? No - I thot not!

Here is an interesting "outside the box" thought experiment: My Beloved Adopted Land (pop: 35M) just took in 25K Syrian refugees. As a thought experiment: (US 350M), take a quarter mill (Take THAT, Donald!). UK (63M) take 45K. You can run down the list of "civilized" countries for yourselves, and do the math for yourselves, to see how many countries must pitch in with the alacrity and conviction we did to absorb all the people who wish to flee Syria.

And when we've done that, we can do the same calculations for all the other parts of the globe where people wish for a material standard of living equivalent to what the see on American TV, while they wish to maintain their existing cultures and particularly their accustomed religions. And where there is very little check on young men's testosterone.

But now we are not Overpopulation so much as we are talking Persecution. Not unlike Northern Europe in the early 1600s when religious fanatics were being "persecuted" both in England and on the Continent and lit out for the "waterworld" of the time — a mid-ocean "new beginning" in the "New World". There was a widespread sentiment in the "Old World", of course, that it was a pity that it hadn't been Plymouth Rock that landed on the Pilgrim Fathers :-)!

We can find dozens — nay HUNDREDS — of such semblances and replications throughout history, and it ain't gonna stop. So that may be the solution to the "overpopulation problem". Let 'em have at each other! Throw a cordon sanitaire around "problem areas" and make copious parachute drops of small arms and ammunition. Sell 'em Weapons of Mass Destruction, or at least let our governments do it, so we, as individuals, don't have to carry the moral burden.

We as individuals can simply "do a cockroach": Live in the crevices of society. Come out to feed only in the dark. Jonestown, anyone :-)?

Nah - on second thought, let's just all run away to sea.

Oh - there IS one solution to the problem of overpopulation: The TrentePieds Green Stamp Method of Birth Control!

TrentePieds

[Kenomac]

This is easily one of the dumbest business ideas that I've ever heard of. Spend billions to attract a bunch of tight wad cruisers who might be foolish enough to want to live many miles out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by floating junk.

When I pass by your garbage patch whilst eating my lobster dinner onboard the cruise ship, I'll wave to you.

[first wind]

Originally Posted by Kenomac

This is easily one of the dumbest business ideas that I've ever heard of. Spend billions to attract a bunch of tight wad cruisers who might be foolish enough to want to live many miles out in the middle of nowhere surrounded by floating junk.

When I pass by your garbage patch whilst eating my lobster dinner onboard the cruise ship, I'll wave to you.

admittedly, i agree that you won't make a dime on the deal. i posted about that early on.

however...

isn't it a spiffy fantasy idea? i mean, just put aside the fact that all living creatures do the things they do for some sort of personal gain. if a dreamer who had a nearly limitless supply of money, and therefore was willing to invest money with no hope of returns on that money, and was really into sailboats and Jimmy Buffet (so, he'd have to be a really cool multi-billionaire and not at all ambitious)....and then said wealthy parrothead built us sailors our own little Tortuga where we could stop by, during a passage, and wench and drink rum and sun ourselves on a man made beach, before resuming our long journey....that'd be pretty nifty.

that wasn't a sarcastic remark, either. i'm serious. that would be super cool. even better if it drifted around and only sailors could ever hope to find it. i'd bloody well live there and use it as a base from which to launch trips to cool parts of the world.

who knows, actually.

i agree, it would not be feasible now. it's not just the money thing. that's big enough...a huge outlay of money to build and maintain it. but, even if you could commandeer some abandoned oil rig or fort. it's really the dealing with established nations thing. that's never an easy thing. people in positions of power tend to be very jealous of that power.

just look at privateers and pirates. they are the same thing. the only difference is the privateer has a hall pass from an accepted nation. the pirate is operating as it's own little sovereign nation in a boat, for it's own benefit. and we all know that pirates are evil, bad, awful, and eventually get hanged or otherwise wiped out by established nations that don't like their turf getting worked by other plunderers.

and if you are a privateer unlucky enough to get a hall pass from and upstart new nation that another established and accepted nation doesn't want to let join the club...like America's privateers during the war of independence...your going to get treated like you don't even have a hall pass.

that would be the biggest problem. even 'good' countries like America, France, England, etc are going to take steps to shut you down. how do you get around that? what could you possibly have that would get them to adopt a live and let live policy towards you?

i mean, face it, you can't not belong to a country. you have to be someone's property. show up without your collar and dogtag...i mean, passport...and someone is going to be in the doghouse.

this idea reminds me of hammock island marina, here on the chesapeake. it's a cool little marina (too bad no live aboards). it's on a small island with a bridge connecting it to the shore. i did some work on someone's boat that was berthed there.

it, admittedly, has a few drawbacks. very shallow on one side. the slips on the far end are subject to really rough water nearly everyday, so sleep isn't going to be very easy if you are berthed in one of them. but, the idea of that little island marina really is cool. if the reality was a bit better and they'd allow live aboards, i'd be there!

i think the same thing about this ocean marina idea. you'd have to have some sort of floating botanical garden/beach thing going on, too. maybe a little boardwalk type town in the center. somewhere pleasant to walk around in or chill out beneath a palm tree with a daiquiri. a facility to do repairs would be a great benefit to people who might run into issues while at sea.

but, even if you could do it....find the money to build and maintain it and get the big boys to leave you alone and let you conduct free trade, an average sailor like me couldn't afford the rates to even visit...not if you intended to turn a profit.

there is one possible suggestion that hasn't been made, yet. but, it would mean making this man-made island/atoll pretty big.

i'm sure some of you are aware that using sailboats to haul goods is making a comeback. small, for now, but who knows where it might go; with the cost of fuel and shipping being one of the biggest sources of fossil fuel pollution.

you could make your sailor's world a trade center. a place where goods could be sailed in, bought and sold, sent out to far off destinations. a re-stocking and repair pit-stop for commercial (and black market) sailboat shipping. if such a place were to be floating and exempt from direct interference from other greedy governments (and sail power only- no stink potters), that could be lucrative. but, all that's a lot of ifs and dreams.

[captlloyd]

OK, we are back to oil rigs again. Lets talk about oil rigs. I know where you can buy an oil rig for a little more than scrap value. It is due to be cut up. (still a lot of money) #1 Oil rigs are not designed to be floating marinas. Mega bucks to convert them and you would still not have what you envision. #2 Moving oil rig. Mega bucks. #3 Maintaining oil rig. Mega bucks. #4 Actually oil rigs don't have that much space to live or operate on. They were not designed for that. #5 Supplying oil rig with fuel, food, living supplies and disposal. Mega bucks.
Does not sound like some kind of deal where you get a bunch of people together and put this deal together.

[TrentePieds]

Quote: "...use something cleaner and more environmentally friendly...something like nuclear power."

Solution is simple. Don't argue with success and don't be hell-bent for "product differentiation". Just use CANDUs. No accidents with them in over fifty years. Oh - and don't put any kinda nuclear facility on a foreshore!

What, by the way, happened to N/V Savannah? THERE was a wonderful way to get rid of a whole LOT of pollution while reducing the use of fossil fuels significantly. Surely if we can run nuclear subs all over the oceans, and in and out of what amounts to a suburb of Seattle (not to mention Vancouver) we can run nuclear powered cargo ships?

And - all you USN veterans - what about those splendid, if prosaic, LSDs? Carrying AAVs? Or better still - WWII DUKWs? Think what THAT could do for the "civilized" world's ability to render humanitarian aid and lift refugees off foreign shores. DUKWs carried two tonnes of cargo, IIRC. AAVs could carry six tonnes if they were suitably modified. Think what such an ensemble — an LSD (am I hallucinating?) with a dozen AAVs — coulda done when the Indus flooded a few years ago and all Punjab was starving! Talk about winning hearts and minds! And reducing some people's need to breed like rabbits to secure the ability to eat in old age!

While we are talking about it: Bei mir there is no ENGINEERING difference twixt designing and building agricultural implements and designing and building weapons carriers. Weapons are made to be destroyed and therefore not to be sold. So why can't we make ploughshares instead of swords and simply GIVE them away to those in need of them. There would be no ECONOMIC difference. Oh, yes - I know. Religion again :-)!

Ah, well. This beautiful coast of British Columbia sustains the soul and offers endless opportunities for hit'n'run agriculture :-)!

Venceremos!

TrentePieds

[first wind]

Originally Posted by TrentePieds

Quote: "...use something cleaner and more environmentally friendly...something like nuclear power."

Solution is simple. Don't argue with success and don't be hell-bent for "product differentiation". Just use CANDUs. No accidents with them in over fifty years. Oh - and don't put any kinda nuclear facility on a foreshore!

What, by the way, happened to N/V Savannah? THERE was a wonderful way to get rid of a whole LOT of pollution while reducing the use of fossil fuels significantly. Surely if we can run nuclear subs all over the oceans, and in and out of what amounts to a suburb of Seattle (not to mention Vancouver) we can run nuclear powered cargo ships?

And - all you USN veterans - what about those splendid, if prosaic, LSDs? Carrying AAVs? Or better still - WWII DUKWs? Think what THAT could do for the "civilized" world's ability to render humanitarian aid and lift refugees off foreign shores. DUKWs carried two tonnes of cargo, IIRC. AAVs could carry six tonnes if they were suitably modified. Think what such an ensemble — an LSD (am I hallucinating?) with a dozen AAVs — coulda done when the Indus flooded a few years ago and all Punjab was starving! Talk about winning hearts and minds! And reducing some people's need to breed like rabbits to secure the ability to eat in old age!

While we are talking about it: Bei mir there is no ENGINEERING difference twixt designing and building agricultural implements and designing and building weapons carriers. Weapons are made to be destroyed and therefore not to be sold. So why can't we make ploughshares instead of swords and simply GIVE them away to those in need of them. There would be no ECONOMIC difference. Oh, yes - I know. Religion again :-)!

Ah, well. This beautiful coast of British Columbia sustains the soul and offers endless opportunities for hit'n'run agriculture :-)!

Venceremos!

TrentePieds

funny pun on LSD.

actually, if memory serves me, the US did send big farm equipment to Ethiopia back in the 80s. no one knew how to use them and we didn't send them farmers. they sat and rusted, unused.

one problem with us sending aid is that, especially if it's money, it never gets from the other country's government to the people. one reason some third world country's are so bad is their own government.

and, people are always more willing to forge swords than plowshares. look up the full lyrics to the Tool song i posted above. it's appropriate to this comment. lol.

heck with it. here's the full song. stupid talking monkeys. lol

"Right In Two"

"Angels on the sideline,
Puzzled and amused.
Why did Father give these humans free will?
Now they're all confused.

Don't these talking monkeys know that
Eden has enough to go around?
Plenty in this holy garden, silly monkeys,
Where there's one you're bound to divide it.
Right in two.

Angels on the sideline,
Baffled and confused.
Father blessed them all with reason.
And this is what they choose.
And this is what they choose...

Monkey killing monkey killing monkey
Over pieces of the ground.
Silly monkeys give them thumbs,
They forge a blade,
And where there's one
they're bound to divide it,
Right in two.
Right in two.

Monkey killing monkey killing monkey.
Over pieces of the ground.
Silly monkeys give them thumbs.
They make a club.
And beat their brother, down.
How they survive so misguided is a mystery.

Repugnant is a creature who would squander the ability to lift an eye to heaven conscious of his fleeting time here.

Cut and divide it all right in two [x4]

Fight over the clouds, over wind, over sky
Fight over life, over blood, over prayer,
overhead and light
Fight over love, over sun,
over another, Fight for each other,
for the ones who are rising.

Angels on the sideline again.
Benched along with patience and reason.
Angels on the sideline again
Wondering when this tug of war will end.

Cut and divide it all right in two [x3]
RIGHT IN TWO!

Right in two..."

[sailingfarmer]

There seems to be enough interest here... maybe a place below the hurricane parallel like something off Costa Rica or Panama? No passports required..... stowage for the hurricane season? Hurricanes not a threat.... or a geat pit stop on the way up from the Canal or doing the Caribbean loop.

[Stumble]

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

There seems to be enough interest here... maybe a place below the hurricane parallel like something off Costa Rica or Panama? No passports required..... stowage for the hurricane season? Hurricanes not a threat.... or a geat pit stop on the way up from the Canal or doing the Caribbean loop.

You are going to need to be at least 100nm to get outside the territorial waters of the countries there. So you will still need passports unless you are planning to land planes from the US.

To get that far out requires a deep water platform, which is grotesquely expensive. From an engineering standpoint possible, but where does the money come from?

Why don't you try the seasteading institute. There are a bunch of crackpots there trying to figure this out. For the last 10 years or so there has been a crowdfunded resource trying to get the details right. So far as I understand every one of their ideas so far has been decided to be too expensive, but feel free to propose something you think will work.

The reality is that anything that floats is expensive, and the larger you make it the more expensive it gets. To be large enough to house a reasonable number of people, act as a breakwater for a marina, and act as a stopping off point mid-ocean you need a massive structure. Which is necessarily far to expensive to make any economical sense.

I am not trying to be nasty, but you haven't started even the basics needed to design this thing. Where will it be, how far off shore, how self sustaining does it need to be, what's the budget for fuel, food, and supplies? How many days of self sufficiency, how large is the fuel pipeline to it. What about legal issues, most of what you are proposing ether requires the backing of a recognized country if near shore, or would be illegal if off shore.

Frankly nothing you have proposed makes any sense. And so far you have refused to even give enough specifics to make it an interesting mental exercise.

[boatman61]

[quote]Frankly nothing you have proposed makes any sense. And so far you have refused to even give enough specifics to make it an interesting mental exercise. [quote]

If he had anything to give he'd not be here.. its a 'Get the CF eggheads going' thread..

[Lizzy Belle]

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

but if you drilling platforms do it...why not have live aboard platforms with ferry service to a port for shopping? It could be protected from bad weather. It could be easily accessible... it could be open to NON-PUMPOUT people. It could be a TOWN!

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

if that rig is touching the sea floor... you have land to attach to... if it is abandoned and there is no one there... it is ZERO DOLLARS per day! This isn't rocket science... there will be 100's of abandoned oil rigs in the future just in the Gulf of Mexico.

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

it could be submarine or portions of it during hurricane force conditions.... or just locate it below the hurricane latitudes...

Or maybe we pass the hat around and just purchase Nevis or some such island in the South Pacific.... Passports anyone? Sea Plane terminal "a must"... Modern marina capable of 10,000 boats?....

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

How about midway...Atlantic Ocean below the northern weather spirals? nice resting place on your way across the pond? Sure to have good French wine stored there... ferro-cement structure comes to mind... out of hurricane alley

Originally Posted by sailingfarmer

There seems to be enough interest here... maybe a place below the hurricane parallel like something off Costa Rica or Panama? No passports required..... stowage for the hurricane season? Hurricanes not a threat.... or a geat pit stop on the way up from the Canal or doing the Caribbean loop.

Well, at least you have a clear view of how and what you want, and where you want it ...

[El Pinguino]

Use one of them Docklift ships... it would be just like living on the hard without all the grit and crap getting on your decks....you could move it around from one exotic location to the next... pretty much the same as real 'cruising'....