Love Canal : A Dream Community On The Fringe Of Niagara Falls

The Everglades is an ecosystem like no other. Its survival depends on immediate actions and restoration. To begin with, CERP will act with the removal of more than 240 miles of canals and levees, greatly improving the health of the Everglades. By removing these canals and levees it will replenish 2.4 million acres with the water it needs. “The restoration of hydrologic conditions of the original natural areas of the south Florida ecosystem will result in Lake Okeechobee once again becoming a healthy lake,” (CERP: the Plan in Depth). Without the canals blocking the way and diverting the water to the coasts, the water will be able to flow back into natural areas. By having all the manmade canals deposit into one area, that area becomes infested

3) A heavy rain pour down the city of Houston on June 19, 2006. According to the article from NBC news, there was a lot of cars stall and many neighborhoods flooded. There was as much as, “10.5 inches of rain reported,” and in some areas there was six inches of rain which caused delays in airports. The Houston city is no stranger to floods yet the amount of rain that poured as such little time was surprising.

Although drinking water is not yet known to have been affected, the groundwater was contaminated with volatile organic compounds and heavy metals (5). Both of these types of contaminants have been linked with one or several of the following: cancer, liver, kidney, and nervous system problems (4). In July 1979, the State Court required that all material be removed from the site by July 1980 (5). The state has spent over $300,000 cleaning this site (5). According to EPA standards, this site is in the "construction completed" stage of clean up. This does not mean, however that actual cleanup is complete because groundwater may need to be treated more than 30 years before contaminants are at accepted levels (5).

The Artificial River, a well thought of 177 paged book written by the author Carol Sheriff whom at the time was an graduate at Yale University and finished it off while an assistant professor at William and Mary. This compelling book captures and emphasis the success and downfall the Erie canal has brought to the people. Sheriff has a clear notion that “progress” viewed differently through the eyes of conflicting people and status. What one envisioned the Canal turn out to be fluctuated from another. Progress to them meant in large part men and women take apart an active role in the community that they are in which the construction of the Erie canal consisted of people doing just that. She apprehended that whomever supported the canal had some dream and hope to actively be apart a wider range or market exchange. In Sheriff words she says that progress would play a central role in defining Northern sectional identity in decades. The book will explore six topics which are titled Vision of Progress, The Triumph of Art over Nature, Reducing time and distance, Politics of land and water, Politics of Business and The Perils of Progress all of which I will touch on throughout the paper.

Stretching 363 miles, The Erie Canal was the first ever canal built in the United States to connect the Atlantic Ocean to western waterways. Canals have expanded territories and have allowed access to broader trading throughout the United States. Carol Sheriff not only looks into how the Eric Canal came to be, but analyzed the culture and the way the society surrounding the Erie Canal transformed and adapted. The Erie Canal opened new trading opportunities because of this new mode of transportation.

The Erie Canal was an important building project that led to economic growth in the United States. When it was built, it was a feat of engineering that was twice as long as any European canal (OI). First, it connected the Atlantic Ocean to the Great Lakes (Doc. 1A), which created a boom in the economy. It also made New York City the nation’s largest and busiest port. In the words of New York State Canal Corporation, “Prior to the construction of the canal, New York City was the nation’s fifth largest seaport…” It caused other countries to want to ship items across the sea over to America. It didn’t just affect New York City. Believe it or not, it was relatively cheap to ship items from New York City to Buffalo. If you used the road to ship

At first, the local government and scientists denied there was any problem at Love Canal, prolonging the exposure while citizens kept getting sicker and sicker and the problem continued to grow. Finally, the governor of New York announced the state would purchase the contaminated homes and help with a relocation effort, with emergency founding by President Carter. While at first exacerbating the situation, the government eventually aided in removing citizens from toxic

During the 1800’s there was no clear passage to take from New York to the American west. This created an issue as the expense to transport goods such as wheat and flour would be a costly amount of approximately $100 per ton. Due to the Appalachian Mountains New York was secluded from much of western America. The Canal took approximately nine years to be completed, despite funding issues that were presented the canal proved to be an expense well made. The Erie Canal (Clinton’s Ditch) was a project known to be doubted upon by political figures, yet despite political opposes to the idea, the result of the canal was noted to be America’s greatest engineering achievement of its time, as the increase of economic prosperity arose in New York because of the canal, alongside popularity for the regions that surrounded the canal; the canal proved to be a success.

Cleveland and other cities Factories dumped pollutants into the lake and the waterways and fertilizer and pesticides from agricultural runoff without much government oversight. Waste from city

In 1952 a fire caused a million dollars’ worth of damage to river boats and riverfront businesses. On June 22, 1969 another river fire engulfed the river, this time the media coverage captured the attention of the nation. Time Magazine described the Cuyahoga as the river that “oozes rather that flows” and in which a person “doesn’t drown but decays”. Many of the residents of Cleveland accepted the pollution as a necessary evil because they had jobs at these factories. This article helped the people of Cleveland pass a 100 million dollar bond to clean up the Cuyahoga River. Much of the industry that both made Cleveland rich and caused its river to burn may never be coming back. The costs of these fires were tremendous, but it did help lead to laws being passed to prevent this from happening in other rivers. One such law was the Clean Water Act of 1972.

In 1953, the canal (which had previously been widened to hold more waste) was nearly full, so it was covered over with clay to seal it. As the vicinity around Niagara Falls grew rapidly, Hooker sold the 16-acres of land to the Niagara Falls city school board for $1. However, the deed for the land included a disclaimer that warned that hazardous chemicals were buried on the property and cleared the company of any future responsibility (Levine 11). On the site, the 99th Street Elementary School was constructed along with houses, sewers, and roads. Early signs of the potential hazards were identifiable in the early 1950s, such as uneven fields with sink holes from decomposing barrels, strong odors, skin irritations on children and dogs and a black, oily substance in basements were ignored by the residents of the area. Not until

It is important to have a basic understanding of where the Love Canal resided and what it was to understand the true impact it had on the society. The Love Canal is located in Niagara Falls, New York; it is so close to Canada that it even connected the Niagara River and Lake Ontario. It was approximately 9,750 feet in length ranges anywhere from 10 to 25 feet in depth. It was a 70-acre area with a whopping 16-acre hazardous waste landfill, and most of the water that filled the canal was impounded. Impounded water is essentially a pool of water that is formed by a pit or dam and used to equip water for wildlife and livestock. The creation of the Love Canal is attributed to William T. Love in the 1890’s, but soon after,

“Why is all this dump in the middle of the city? I don’t know what Niagara Falls was thinking. I mean, don’t get me wrong Niagara Falls is great, but the smell makes your eyes watery and you just want to hold your breath the whole way down Military, Portage, and Niagara Falls Boulevard. The city should be building a good well of businesses, but to be honest, that dump is destroying the beauty. The smell is annoying and it’s an obvious and constant reminder that this city needs

When looking into the pollution for my hometown, I found that it is well above average. Niagara Falls is also known as homing many Chemical Producing plants and Industrial Producing plants. Even though many have since closed down or are running very limited which is causing the Air to get better the damage done to the local area by dumping is still a factor on air quality. Many people have herd of Love Canal which is in Niagara Falls where there was a whole area that was evocated as they had to dig up the area to remove barrels of waste that were leaking

In 1942 Hooker Electrochemical Corporation (now Hooker Chemical and Plastics, a subsidiary of Occidental Petroleum Corporation) began to fill an abandoned canal a half-mile long with toxic chemicals from the manufacture of chlorinated hydrocarbons and caustics. [2]