China is on a giant construction spree and nothing is going to cease it — not even mountains . Entire mountaintops are being pull down to fill in valleys , paving the way for next cities . The problem is that no one really knows what they ’re doing . “ [ E]arth - move on this scale without scientific support is folly , ” warn three Chinese engineering professorsinNature .
As China design to move100 million rural mass into cities , quick and contaminating construction has become the norm . You see buildings that are hardly finishedfall asunder . These tidy sum - moving projects are similarly overhasty , but they ’re being carried out on an even more monumental scale by engineers with lilliputian experience in flattening mountains . What if , for lesson , a metropolis establish on fluid soil collapses in the pelting ?
That ’s a lawful veneration in Yan’an , just one of several cities being create on flattened land . Valleys have been filled with silt — soft soil that can easy tumble when wet . Dozens of hilltop all over China are being razed with little regard for other environmental headache like air befoulment , soil corroding , and groundwater loss . There ’s so much money to be made — for sealed people — that the risk are not being properly canvass , argue the prof in Nature .
The whole post is reminiscent of a Chinese fable in which an old man refuse all expectations by slowly jab away two muckle in front of his house . It ’s meant to be a story of perseverance . ( My Chinese immigrant parent , in fact , drilled the history into my head all the time when I was a child . ) But when fable becomes literal fact , you might need to check your skill . [ Nature ]
Top image : The apparent horizon of Chongqing , one of the urban center where mountains have been remove to take into account for expansion.faunng/flickr
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