US To Give Away Free Lighthouses As GPS Makes Them Unnecessary - Slashdot
source link: https://news.slashdot.org/story/23/05/26/2142232/us-to-give-away-free-lighthouses-as-gps-makes-them-unnecessary
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US To Give Away Free Lighthouses As GPS Makes Them Unnecessary
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Yet the public remains fascinated by the evocative beacons, which are popular tourist attractions, beloved local landmarks and the subject of countless photographers and artists, standing lonely but strong against tides and storms, day and night and flashing life-saving beams of light whatever the weather. "People really appreciate the heroic role of the solitary lighthouse keeper," he said, explaining their allure. "They were really the instruments to provide safe passage into some of these perilous harbors which afforded communities great opportunities for commerce, and they're often located in prominent locations that offer breathtaking views."
The GSA has been transferring ownership of lighthouses since Congress passed the National Historic Lighthouse Preservation Act in 2000. About 150 lighthouses have been transferred, 80 or so given away and another 70 auctioned, raising more than $10m. This year, six lighthouses are being offered at no cost to federal, state or local government agencies, non-profits, educational organizations or other entities that are willing to maintain and preserve them and make them publicly available for educational, recreational or cultural purposes. [...] Some past lighthouse sales have ended up with them converted into private residences.
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I reckon maybe.. I guess the water movement/waves can be like ASMR.. but what if there's a storm? Most peaceful by my guess is in the middle of nowhere.. someplace like Montana or Wyoming? Or maybe in the desert? Someplace in Arizona or New Mexico?
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A storm? The lighthouse has probably been there for a century already. I think it can take a storm.
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Storms are noisy though. I was talking about that.
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The lighthouse has probably been there for a century already. I think it can take a storm.
Spent an hour composing a reply and Slashdot's post-vetting mechanism ate it.
Some lighthouses have nice houses on a seaside lot - sometimes almost mansions - suitable for conversion to a seaside house (if you aren't looking to do pleasure boating, or are willing to do it near a major ship-eating navigation hazard). Others are structures on the ends of piers, some rocky cliff, or a natural or artificial island (such as a pile of rocks in the middle of a mile-long shoal), often with a history of being a replacement for a previous lighthouse taken out by a storm.
In this years group of lighthouses being disposed of, all but four are on a "trade to a city or nonprofit for having them fix up and maintain it as a museum or something" deal. Some of these looked like they might make acceptable seaside homes, with an unknown amount of fixing up.
Of the remaining four, I looked at three. One is a structure on the out-in-lake-Superior end of a breakwater - said breakwater ovbiously designed to survive and break up giant ice flows blown over it in winter. Another is a masonry tinyhouse on a pile of rip-rap in the middle of a shoal in Long Island Sound. A third is a more substantial builiding on the end of a pier at the entrance to the third largest commercial shipping port on the Great Lakes.
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For completeness: The fourth is also in Long Island Sound, built on the Penfield Reef. It is a more substantial small house (four bedrooms), also built on a pile of rip-rap. It's said you can walk to it at low tide - and that a family was swept away to their deaths attempting this. Also that it's haunted by a former keeper who, after being trapped in it for weeks by a series of storms, tried to row to town the holidays and was capsized and drowned. It's on the National Register of Historic Place, which limits what can be done with it.
The coast guard has been trying to unload it since 2007, but it's complicated because it's built on land leased from the state and the fed can only sell the stuff built on it - you need to negotiate a lease in addition and the state can refuse to renew and confiscate it. The first sale fell through because of concern about that. Another was abandoned when the buyer found out about the National Registry requirements. The third failed when the buyer - who wanted to use it for a columbarium, had the authorization bill stuck in the state senate and wasn't able to negotiate a land lease. Then hurricane Sandy made a mess of it, which the Coast guard fuxed up - for a million bux. Then a couple years ago it was sold at auction for $300k - but now it's back on the block again, so it looks like that fell through as well.
Doesn't look promising.
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(There's a sign warning to look out for submerged rocks. Several boats were damaged while trying to get close enough to read the sign.)
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That seems silly. Why don't they just put a lighthouse there to warn people?
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One small advantage of that location is that not far off, at the tip of Staten Island, there is a comprehensive museum of all things lighthouse-related. Restoration and decorating ideas are just a ferry ride away.
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"Textarea cache" extension for Firefox prevents exactly the kind of text loss you experienced.
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There's a big difference between the structure surviving a storm and it being peaceful inside that structure during one.
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While your statement is true, it is also less of a problem. In light-houses that are built proper. By angling the cut of the stones that make the tower and creating a kind of dovetail on each stone, the structure becomes stronger as the storm gets stronger. That solution is as brilliant as its concept is simple. Not easy to manufacture, requires expert masons to apply and an expensive type of dense stones.
The shape of those stones make the tower wind and water tight. Unfortunately, stone can only take so mu
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Yes, they are built to last. I like listening to storms in general, but in a lighthouse it might be a bit loud.
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Have you seen the movie? Not exactly a peaceful life I'd want.
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Lighthouses are typically in very, very exposed locations where you really wouldn't want to put anything other than, well, a lighthouse. They're also often quite isolated, with bare-bones facilities, can be cold and damp, and in a number of cases when there's a storm there's no way in or out until the weather clears up. You need to be a pretty special sort of person to live in one...
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There are some that are relatively near entrances to ports. Those would likely have more significant resale value so are probably not the ones being offered for free. Even if free, maintenance might be expensive as you'd need lots of specialist skills and equipment. Whilst they generally have high thermal mass they also have large surface area to internal volume ratios and higher than average external wind flows, so I expect heating them is not cheap. Plus mains water, sewage, etc., might be an issue.
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"Sounds like a peaceful life."
Indeed, if you buy one like Boston Light, that is 9 miles out at sea and you need a seaworthy vessel to reach, you can be sure the in-laws won't come on a surprise visit.
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Yeah, until you realize you left your glasses downstairs, and have to go up and down 40 flights of stairs again.
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You could buy a pair for each level, although laser eye surgery might be cheaper
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Missile silo is a hole that goes down - lighthouse is a hole that goes up. Either of them are fascinating, whimsical dwelling locations.
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When I visited the Netherlands, they mentioned that a number of the historic windmills are used as private dwellings (and at least one is rented out as an AirB&B), with the owners in turn required to maintain them in historic condition and have to be trained to do so. The people we talked to said that there's actually way more demand than available windmills.
(Any Dutch people, feel free to correct what we were told!)
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Not just private, but also commercial dwellings nothing to do with anything needing wind. A lot of them were originally used to grind corn or pump water where a single modern electric pump or corn processing plant can do the combined effort of an entire regions windmills.
If you do ever get to the Netherlands the largest free standing windmill in the world is now a really nice fish restaurant http://www.noordmolen.nl/ [noordmolen.nl]
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If you get to Amsterdam and would like to drink beer outside a nice local windmill [wikipedia.org], then this is a nice place [wikipedia.org], especially at this time of the year.
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You'd have to pay me (quite a bit) to live in a lighthouse. They're rarely on desirable waterfront, they're usually not conveniently located near urban facilities, and they require maintenance.
If I could get a year's sabbatical from work, the government paid me my regular salary, and I didn't have a wife and kids to think about... I'd take it for a year as an experience. But as a more or less long term lifestyle choice it's just not going to happen.
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They're rarely on desirable waterfront,
Steep (aka, scenic) rocky sea cliffs is pretty much a definition of "scenic". Apparently to you "seafront" is only interesting if... what, there's a public beach there or something?
they're usually not conveniently located near urban facilities,
Not being near urban areas is the goal.
and they require maintenance.
... in exchange for getting the facility for free. Maintenance instead of a rent or mortgage.
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There's a difference between going to see something and having a practical use for something making it a desirable location to be permanently. Rocky sea cliffs are great to visit, look at, and photograph, but rarely fun to live near offering you no practical benefit of living near the sea.
He didn't say urban areas, he said urban facilities. There's a difference between not living in the city centre or burbs (desired by many) and not having a garbage collection service (desired by virtually no one).
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Maintenance costs that dwarf the costs of a mortgage/rent. You'll need to use special type of stone, because other types of stone can't handle the stresses that (salt) water and storms the tower is subjected to, 24 hours a day and 7 days in the week. Oh, and there are very few masons still around that know how to do this particular work. Good luck finding those. Good luck with paying hazard fees on top of their very high normal fees, because of the location of the tower. And all that for a structure which l
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No neighbors and difficult to reach? Sounds good to me.
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Just like the basement with the brick walls and windows at the top. Homey.
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Yes, the scenic views of lighthouses are totally equivalent to bricked up basements [peakpx.com].
Are you deliberately trying to write inane comments, or was this an accident?
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You have have a fairly low user id, you've been around slashdot a bit... I'm pretty sure that we all live in Mom's basement around here.
So, if you are moving from the basement to a lighthouse then you'll find some nice differences like the scenery but also some homey comforts like solid construction and maybe some dampness. Maybe Mom can bring your dinner up the stairs sometime at the lighthouse!
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You sure do talk about basements a lot.
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I think you read that comment too quickly. GP said:
which is completely different than your
But I will avoid your snark.
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Sounds like you might appreciate solitary confinement...
"Ahh...what we have here is Failure To Communicate..."
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...check the ice on this one [detroitnews.com]. You won't be leaving before spring. Or maybe summer.
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Bah, luxury! When I were a lad we had to live in a lighthouse frozen in a glacier buried thirty mile underground. I would have killed to live in a lighthouse entombed in ice, I would have.
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I'm holding out for Point Conception.
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Would it be harder to disable GPS (something the US government itself might choose to do "because reasons") or a number of physical constructions built to last a hundred years and scattered over thousands of miles?
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There are numerous examples of property that the government held for the good of the public that it returned when they were no longer needed or superseded by improved versions:
Pony Express relay stations
Rail lines replaced by public-owned
Military bases no longer needed (BRAC list by state) [epa.gov]
Research stations and testing ranges
Blimp and Dirigible hangers
Ordnance factories
Weather monitoring stations
and yes, lighthousesI wouldn't be surprised in the next few decades if launch facilities and NASA tracking station
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Homer’s soul mate!
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Any oceanside building is difficult to maintain. A lighthouse that's directly exposed to the ocean will be incredibly difficulty and expensive to maintain.
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You're thinking like some of the lighthouses that are directly in the ocean. Most lighthouses are on land in a position that the ocean can't get to.
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Ocean can't, seaspray can.
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Should GPS fail, navigating by coastal AM radio stations is far more useful. Wait a minute...
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Now that lighthouses are automated, the supporting facility for them is used as lodging for tourists. I stayed at Point Arena lighthouse in CA a few years ago and it was very cool. The other couple staying in the other house by us were German doctors and I had them over for dinner and we talked for hours. After that I went out for some night pictures and then the next day we toured the lighthouse. I really hope new owners of these properties continue to do the same: renting the support structures and giving tours of the lighthouses.
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There is a difference.
Personally, I disagree with the former term being applied.
Because you know the day there's a major G5 geomagnetic storm that puts out our satellites for more than a day, we're gonna be kicking ourselves for discarding the backup system.
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... the GPS on the ship fails?
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They can use GLONASS.
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I meant the device...
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You aren't going to just be able to swap to navigation by lighthouse even now. You'd need to get a fix via stars, etc., assuming you have the training or skills. Most likely, you are going to use the radio to request assistance. If you are right on the coast who knows, even a phone might work.
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Maybe a phone can even work for GPS out at sea without a data connection but I've never tried it. you might have to download Google maps for the Atlantic, and I presume streetmap was provided by a little Google sub.
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I *think* part of the LTE standard includes having towers send periodic beacons that include high precision timestamps, so a phone that knows where the tower is located (via lookup) can use it just like a GPS satellite as a high precision triangulation reference.
That said... I think they use GPS as their precision time source, so if GPS went bye-bye, their own precision would probably deteriorate severely within a few days as their own local clocks stopped getting recalibrated every minute or so (unless NTP
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Yeah, just looked it up... GPS has about 100X the resolution/precision as NTP... 1 microsecond vs 100 microsecond precision. So, if the relationship between time precision and triangulation precision is linear, a phone that can achieve ~10-meter precision with GPS would be down to ~1km precision with LTE after a few days of drift without a GPS timekeeping reference.
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