Global warming over the next 40 years will cut through Arctic transportation networks like a double-edged sword, limiting access in certain areas and vastly increasing it in others, a new UCLA study predicts.
“As sea ice continues to melt, accessibility by sea will increase, but the viability of an important network of roads that depend on freezing temperatures is threatened by a warming climate,” said Scott Stephenson, a UCLA graduate student in geography and the study’s lead author. (more…)
Machu Picchu Temple of the Sun (also named "the watch tower"). The stones of its dry-stone walls built by the Incas can move slightly and resettle without the walls collapsing. Image credit: Fabricio Guzmán. Source: Wikipedia
The UNESCO World Heritage program aims to protect cultural and natural sites considered important to the common heritage of humanity. However, many of these sites are now threatened by excessive tourism, according to Christina Cameron, professor at the Université de Montréal School of Architecture and holder of the Canada Research Chair on Built Heritage.
A case in point is Machu Picchu in Peru. “This site should receive no more than 2,000 visitors per day, but it currently welcomes twice as many,” says Cameron, who sounded the alarm while speaking as a panelist at a celebration commemorating 25 years of Old Québec being such a site.
“The UNESCO World Heritage convention was established in a spirit of solidarity and international cooperation in order to share best practices for conservation,” says Cameron. “It was the post-war era and people were seeking for a way to bring together members of the international community. Tourism was never an objective of the convention. In fact, these sites were meant to be protected from it.” (more…)
