Comments on: Las Vegas shopping center boasts that it uses "imported water" in its "water feature"

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 04:15:00 +0000

Where are the places that are so temperate that you don’t need to use heating or air conditioning, and also have plentiful local water? We can’t fit seven billion people in Hawaii.

By: hymenopterid

hymenopterid — Sun, 10 Feb 2013 03:30:00 +0000

True enough, but the places that they are siphoning water from are perfectly inhabitable and not overcrowded. There is little reason for humans to live in Las Vegas other than the economic incentive created by legalized gambling. It would be simpler just to legalize blackjack where it rains.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 22:01:00 +0000

Most of the world is uninhabitable to significant numbers of humans without massive use of technology and concomitant fuel use.

By: hymenopterid

hymenopterid — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 17:33:00 +0000

To keep cool without wasting energy or water,
__( .)=
____)
try not living in the desert.

By: WinstonSmith2012

WinstonSmith2012 — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 16:20:00 +0000

ALL water is “imported.” It’s just that the atmosphere usually does that.

By: Loren Pechtel

Loren Pechtel — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 16:10:00 +0000

And so people won’t think they’re breaking the law.

By: wysinwyg

wysinwyg — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 15:26:00 +0000

It would be interesting to see a quantitative breakdown of how much of Las Vegas’ economy goes through the casinos — you guys are apparently really defensive about this but I’m guessing more than half the money in Las Vegas goes through the casinos.

It’s fairly obvious there’s a local economy — there’s one everywhere and I never disputed this. The only question is whether Las Vegas wastes resources.

Comparing Las Vegas to Phoenix doesn’t get LV off the hook for its own wastefulness. I actually think it’s kinda pathetic when people use the “well, those guys are even worse!” excuse.

By: wysinwyg

wysinwyg — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 15:22:00 +0000

I didn’t say there was no manufacturing or innovation so it would be hard to show I’m “incorrect”. I asked whether there was much implying that there isn’t much and in relative terms I’m fairly certain that’s true. You don’t dispute the fact that LV wastes resources I take it?

By the way, when you throw out the downtownproject dot com link you look like an astroturfer.

By: Deidzoeb

Deidzoeb — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 15:09:00 +0000

“Town Square Las Vegas cares about the environment and community [, in spite of the fact that] we use imported water in our water feature.”
Fixed that for you.

By: bobtato

bobtato — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 13:32:00 +0000

I’m kind of disappointed to hear it’s just a regulatory dodge. When I first saw the sign I thought there might be some interesting ecological rationale behind it.
You could imagine that it might be more sustainable (in water terms, if not energy terms) for Vegas to ship in its water from far away. Globally, sucking a million gallons from a precarious desert water cycle is probably far more damaging than chipping a million gallons off a glacier.
(Obviously there’s a whole separate argument about whether a city should exist in such a fragile environment to begin with).

By: Thebes42

Thebes42 — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 03:57:00 +0000

Edward Abbey said a much a generation ago – “The blazing cities feed on the defenseless interior.”

BTW, if you didn’t care, wtf did you even post a comment?

I care, because I live in the rural South West where traditional irrigation systems older than our nation are in jeopardy because outsiders move to the big cities and waste vast quantities of water on shit like a green lawn.

By: Thebes42

Thebes42 — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 03:48:00 +0000

By “importing” water, do they mean the water stolen from the Dine Nation to slurry pump the coal from land also stolen from it?
Because, you know, nothing says “caring about the community” like stealing from the poor communities to your East.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 00:40:00 +0000

A GIS appears to show that Town Square has xeriscape plantings. The big pool/ fountain will work like a huge evaporative cooling device and cool the area downwind by 10-15°F.

By: UncaScrooge

UncaScrooge — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 00:21:00 +0000

Vegas: A wasteland is a terrible thing to waste.

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Thu, 07 Feb 2013 00:06:00 +0000

Of course that depends a heck of a lot on what kind of water and/or and plant landscaping is going in. The golf courses and artificial lakes covering much of the Vegas area sure aren’t doing much to help the region’s environmental footprint.

By: chgoliz

chgoliz — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:44:00 +0000

Yeah, recalibrate your sarcasm meter.

I would pay big money to watch Limbaugh’s head explode in Canada.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:24:00 +0000

Water and plants in the landscape create a significant local cooling effect which reduces energy consumption.

By: Antinous / Moderator

Antinous / Moderator — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:21:00 +0000

Don’t bother answering, I’ve already stopped caring about what people that don’t know what they are talking about are going to say.

Can I get you to extend that to not making comments with the expectation that no one should answer you?

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 23:05:00 +0000

Do a little research on the Downtown Project happening in Las Vegas and you’ll see that your posit will be proven incorrect. Innovation, manufacturing, and social benefits abound.

It doesn’t really matter if Las Vegas has a thriving manufacturing sector or not, because by the tourism board’s own admission everything just stays in Vegas anyway.

By: peregrinus

peregrinus — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:38:00 +0000

I like to think the sign was created by a snarky undergrad who had to spend the summer helping his mafia dad run the place.

By: Jonathan Badger

Jonathan Badger — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:31:00 +0000

While there’s no question that cities located in a desert aren’t very environmentally friendly, Phoenix, a much larger desert city, is considered a worse offender as in the subtitle of a recent book about it: “Bird on Fire: Lessons from the World’s Least Sustainable City”.

That being said, Vegas is an actual city with people living in it that have actually have jobs that have nothing to do with casinos, just like not everyone in Orlando works for the Mouse.

By: dmc10

dmc10 — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:28:00 +0000

Rush the band, or was I just missing your sarcasm? Rush Limbaugh’s head would explode if he lived Canada… if he thinks the Dems in the US are liberal, oh boy, he should try up north. LOL.

By: BillStewart2012

BillStewart2012 — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:27:00 +0000

So the sign’s really there to tell the town not to hassle them about the water feature…

By: BillStewart2012

BillStewart2012 — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:26:00 +0000

Rush Limbaugh? You’re welcome to him!

By: Kelly Rozinski

Kelly Rozinski — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 22:20:00 +0000

Do a little research on the Downtown Project happening in Las Vegas and you’ll see that your posit will be proven incorrect. Innovation, manufacturing, and social benefits abound. There is more to Las Vegas than gambling. It’s a city like any other where people live, work, and go to school. It just happens to have the strip running down the middle of it. Downtownproject dot com

By: dmc10

dmc10 — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 21:28:00 +0000

And Bieber, and Avril too please. But I prefer we keep Rush (ok I like Sara M too)

By: wysinwyg

wysinwyg — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:22:00 +0000

What’s Las Vegas’ major industry? Does the major industry have any social benefits? Costs? Is there much manufacturing in Las Vegas? Innovation?

I can understood getting a little defensive about your home town but Las Vegas prides itself — and markets itself — on its culture of conspicuous consumption. It should be no surprise whatsoever when people get the impression that Las Vegas wastes a lot of resources. Especially when it’s simply a fact that it does.

By: Kaywon

Kaywon — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:16:00 +0000

maybe they meant the sign to say “impotable”

By: Marc

Marc — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:15:00 +0000

You’ve misunderstood what I believe “Cleo” was meaning when he used the term “valuable resources imported from elsewhere”. $o go ahead and $top caring about what people that don’t know what they are talking about are going to $ay…a$ thi$ include$ you.

By: Brainspore

Brainspore — Wed, 06 Feb 2013 20:07:00 +0000

When one lives in the desert, a small water fountain in the park area of an outdoor mall is nice.

When one lives in the alps, outdoor space heaters are nice. But they don’t make a lot of sense from an environmental perspective.