My equaintance Danny Bloom — following up on the Polar Cities idea first proposed by James Lovelock–was spotlighted this week by Andy Revkin in The New York Times.
Glad to see Danny’s hard work getting some attention. My favorite comment on his concept, which, simply put, is that if we don’t change our lifestyles, we’re going to have to changes our lives — and move north — comes from this hardy Alaskan.
What makes you think were going to let all you folks in? ; }
Fairbanks, AK
— Posted by Constance Ledlow
Kit Stolz 
Hi Kit,
Yes, that comment from Fairbanks caught me attention, too. Here is a webcam of real life in Fairbanks 24/7, taken just outside the offices of the Fairbanks Daily News-Miner. Not much to see, but in terms of sunlight and darkness during summer months versus winter months, it’s interesting.
One of the possible sites for a future polar city communinty would very well be in Fairbanks, using the buildings of UAF, the state university there, dormitories and all, as part of the polar city complex in year 2500 or so.
So that Fairbanksan’s comment was pointed.
And in fact, humor aside, one of the issues worth discussing in terms of polar cities in the future is this:
who gets in, who gets left out, who guards them, who administers them, who defends them from marauders, etc.
Indeed: “who says we’re going to let you folks in” is a kind of MAD MAX meets THE ROAD on THE DAY AFTER TOMORROW worst-case scenario.
I, for one, hope it never comes to that…
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http://beta.newsminer.com/arcticcam/
Webcam, Fairbanks
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Innaresting picture…makes me shiver…
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Fairbanks does get cold in winter, sometimes -20 F on campus of UAF. But summers are nice. But most interesting for folks in Lower 48 with this webcam is that you can see the long darkness of the long winter nights by checking the time stamps, and also by seeing the midnight sun at 1 am in the summer months.
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Glad you found my comment notable. Just want to add that indeed it does get -20F on campus. It also gets -30F, -40F and -50F or more during our lovely winters. We are now entering break up and are actually at 40F. However it could be -20F in a few days as we are expecting a cold front out of Russia. It is not unusual in the winter to go from -30F to 30F in less than 12 hours. Our summers here in the interior are short but sweet and we often reach 80F to 90F. Ah, life in the land of the midnight sun. I really enjoy your blog.
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Thanks, Constance, and thanks for commenting. Nice to hear from the still-often-frozen North.
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Hi Connie, Glad you found the blog here. I emailed you but maybe it did not get through to you. a reporter at Fairbanks newsw Miner might wnt to chat with you about this exchagne. can email me? at
danbloom GMAIL
former Juneau resident
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