My Humble Plea: Get Rid of Telephone Poles

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Discussion Overview

The discussion centers around the aesthetic and practical concerns regarding telephone poles and overhead power lines, as well as related topics like light pollution and urban planning. Participants express their feelings about the presence of telephone poles in various environments, comparing urban and rural settings.

Discussion Character

  • Debate/contested
  • Conceptual clarification
  • Exploratory

Main Points Raised

  • One participant expresses strong dislike for telephone poles, citing their ugliness and the negative impact on the landscape, particularly in suburban areas.
  • Another participant counters that telephone poles serve a practical purpose, such as preventing cars from going over cliffs in icy conditions.
  • Some participants mention the gradual transition to underground power lines in certain neighborhoods, while noting that geographical challenges may prevent this in others.
  • Light pollution is brought up as a separate concern, with participants sharing images and discussing its implications on visibility and aesthetics.
  • There are references to the differences in urban planning and city aesthetics between places like Washington, D.C., and rural areas.
  • One participant questions the validity of visual comparisons of light pollution and ice cap melting, suggesting that observed differences may be artifacts of the images rather than actual changes.

Areas of Agreement / Disagreement

Participants express a range of opinions on telephone poles, with some advocating for their removal and others defending their necessity. The discussion remains unresolved, with multiple competing views on the topic.

Contextual Notes

Some arguments depend on subjective aesthetic preferences and practical considerations, while discussions about light pollution and environmental changes involve complex interpretations of visual data.

Cyrus
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(a) Telephone Poles. I really, really hate telephone poles. They are abhorrently ugly. Every time I drive down the road- wires, wires, wires. Everywhere wires!

I live way too close to a major city for there to be wires everywhere. The water is under the ground in pipes, why does the power lines have to be above ground? They get hit by lightning during rain and cause the power to go out. They cost money because the county has to cut the trees so they don't grow into the power lines. They total your car when you hit one.

PH2008070201580.jpg


BAH! Wires, WIRES! BAH UGH!

Contrast that with downtown DC, which rarely has telephone poles

47301219.aw9p.jpg


Despite being in a major city, the sky seems less obstructed with wires everywhere.

I'd cut down every last one if I could.

Do you have lots of telephone poles where you live? Why? Isnt this America in the year 2009?

I have found that I really like the country, or the city. I hate the inbetween suburbs. It's a half assed version of each with strip malls.

Which leads me to the second thing I hate, strip malls!

http://i.treehugger.com/files/dunnfoundation.jpg

Wires and strip malls! double fail! Is there no such thing as city planning? It looks like a 3rd world slum. All you need to do is add shanty houses around the periphery and you're in downtown Rio de Janeiro.
 
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Man, I hate people who hate something and want to talk about it. But it'd rather not tell you about it.
 
humanino said:
Man, I hate people who hate something and want to talk about it. But it'd rather not tell you about it.

http://pal2pal.com/BLOGEE/images/uploads/rooney.jpg​

Have you ever noticed how posts like the one above make you want to kill the poster? I've been around for a long time but that's one lousy post. What ever happened to the good ole days when people put more thought behind posts?
 
BTW, it's true, DC sucks with all those wires ! Here we have trees, cows, fresh air... We don't even have electricity. I have to run a bicycle anytime I want to read you Cyrus, this how much I love you.
 
humanino said:
BTW, it's true, DC sucks with all those wires ! Here we have trees, cows, fresh air...

http://www.esquire.com/cm/esquire/images/john-mclaughlin-WI-0209-lg-55962253.jpg

WRONG! The anwser is: DC doesn't have telephone poles.

BYE BYEEEEEE
 
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Cyrus said:
people put more thought behind posts?
that was before internet, with regular mail.
 
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where I live, just the desert and my beloved camel to get me where ever I want.
 
Stratosphere said:
I hate light pollution.

http://www.perimeno.ca/pics/Night.jpg
Earth at night 2000

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Flat_earth_night.png
earth at night 2007

Africa sucks. They have two lightbulbs for the whole continent! (I think those pictures look nice though)
 
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  • #10
Are you kidding? Telephone poles are the only thing there is to stop the cars from going over the cliffs when they skid on ice in winter here! :biggrin:

Actually, it rather depends which neighborhood you're in around here. Slowly, they're burying the cables, and I live in a development where everything was put in underground. But, there are some areas where they probably will never be able to do that because of too much rock instead of soil. It seems to get done when they need to dig up the roads for something else, like putting in city sewer to a neighborhood or replacing water mains, or when a road gets expanded since they have to move the poles then anyway.
 
  • #11
Moonbear said:
Are you kidding? Telephone poles are the only thing there is to stop the cars from going over the cliffs when they skid on ice in winter here! :biggrin:

Actually, it rather depends which neighborhood you're in around here. Slowly, they're burying the cables, and I live in a development where everything was put in underground. But, there are some areas where they probably will never be able to do that because of too much rock instead of soil. It seems to get done when they need to dig up the roads for something else, like putting in city sewer to a neighborhood or replacing water mains, or when a road gets expanded since they have to move the poles then anyway.

Before:

PH2008070201580.jpg
http://img193.imageshack.us/img193/8582/poles.png

After editing. I took out the wires, and replaced the traffic lights with metal supports that are actually in other parts of this same road.



Wow, so that's what the sky looks like, and how not to make ur city look like a slum.
 
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  • #12
Cyrus said:
I took out the wires, and replaced the traffic lights with metal supports that are actually in other parts of this same road.
Are you a kind of magician ? Can you bring the wires out here, just to check how it looks ?
 
  • #13
Stratosphere said:
I hate light pollution.

http://www.perimeno.ca/pics/Night.jpg
Earth at night 2000

http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/6/61/Flat_earth_night.png
earth at night 2007

Fascinating images. I already had the 2000 one but not the new 2007 image. At first it looks like the city lights are exactly the same in 2007, but after adjusting the color balance I can see that there is more illumination coming out of most of the big cities.

The big difference you really notice, though, is all the melted ice caps. Not only can you see the ice receding, but you can also see the water level around parts of the coastline and lakes rising. I've made an animated gif for visual comparison:

http://img189.imageshack.us/img189/4547/2000vs2007.gif
 
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  • #14
what?
 
  • #15
JungleBeast said:
The big difference you really notice, though, is all the melted ice caps.
I think that's actually an artifact. Possibly different atmospheric conditions but when I first saw it I was thinking that it looked like the major reason for the difference between the two was a greater time elapse in the second image. That would explain the increased light and brightness, the added detail to certain countries and in the oceans, as well as the lack of cloudy areas which you seem to be interpreting as ice. If it were ice we would be talking about hundreds or thousands of miles* of ice receding in a matter of seven years.

Edit: You'll note that there is a similar cloudy area over northern africa which I don't think is known for its glaciers.

Edit2: *That is to say square miles in total.
 
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