Houston, Texas, the first mega dome city - a good idea?

I was fascinated last night when I saw the documentary of the 1,500ft proposed dome over Houston The Houston Dome. I live near the Eden project in Cornwall, England and so was fascinated with the anglo forefront technology. The experience gained means that giant geodesic hexagon domes may soon be a new feature of the global landscape in the very-near-future.

 

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There are some problems that this enclosure would cause.

It would retain heat that is generated from all those people living within it.

It would retain pollution from everything that gives off pollutants..

A minor earthquake and the whole thing will collapse.

How do you clean it so that it lets sunlight or any light through after many years of filth buildup?

To many problems as I see it right now.

 

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That dome idea just silly. I lived in Houston for 7 years. The city is very spread out and covers a large area. Their dome only covers downtown, a relatively small area compared to the whole city...all of the residential areas, where people live, would be unprotected.

Hurricanes really aren't much of a threat to Houston anyway. It's 40 miles inland. The most destructive part of the hurricane is the storm surge, which wouldn't affect Houston at all. The biggest risk comes from the torrential rains that accompany the storm and cause flash flooding. A dome wouldn't protect against this. When I lived there, the remnants of a tropical storm caused it to rain 10 inches in just 2 hours. The water rose so quickly, that me and my '85 Honda civic floated down the road. The water was as deep as the bottom of the steering wheel, and I had to escape via the hatchback.

In the sample videos on the site, they also talk about the oppressive heat. I'm not sure how a clear dome would protect against that. Seems like it would just make it worse with the greenhouse effect....with no wind to clear out the heat. I wonder how well those panels would stand up to years of intense UV exposure, as most plastics break down when exposed to long-term UV.

Houston doesn't get many hurricanes, but it does get tornadoes and large hail. I wonder how the dome would stand up against that.

All in all, it would be a hugely expensive project that really wouldn't provide much protection from anything. I believe this is the case of engineers just dreaming about whether it would be possible to build...rather than it's actually use.

 

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The area is pretty geologically stable..so earthquakes really wouldn't be an issue. Tornadoes and softball-sized hail would be though.

I didn't even think about the pollution issue..that's a good point. Ground level ozone would also be a problem.

 

Im thinking there will be a giant removeable portion of the roof like on some of the larger sports domes where the roof can be moved. It makes sense for a structure of that size.

 

All your worries are explained in this documentary video that you all need to see in order to proceed with a coherent discussion The Houston Dome

 

The whole point of the dome is to protect Houston from hurricanes. Considering the last major hurricane to hit Houston directly was Alison in 1983, that caused 5 billion dollars in damage...doesn't seem like a very worthwhile investment. The billions of dollars used to build the thing would be better spent on flood control...which is a real issue in Houston. I heard someone say "It floods in Houston if I pee to long"

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So you think your intuition is better than the scientific assessment team then, and that you don't need to see the video to know that your right?

 

I watched it...All of my worries aren't explained. Like:

How do plants under the dome get water?

Who pays for it's construction and maintenance?

Why build something to protect a city from an event that only happens every 25 years or so, when flash flooding occurs several times a year?

Where does all the rain water coming off the dome go?

I'm sure there's more.

 

Also, how do you keep bad pilots from accidentally crashing into it?

 

I don't think I've ever seen an idea so idiotic, so out of tune with the realities we face as a nation. Whoever proposed this idea should be exiled to Dubai.

 

That's from the link. How does heat put the city in peril? And how does a dome protect a city from the heat and humidity?...they don't seem to address that. The heat in Texas is more of an inconvenience than anything. People lived here long before a/c.

What other natural disasters would the dome protect the city from? The only natural disasters that really occur in Houston are infrequent hurricanes, tornadoes and hail, brush fires, and most frequently flooding. The biggest risk to the city, flooding, isn't even addressed.

I'm wondering why they picked Houston, and not some Florida city? The heat and humidity is worse there, and hurricanes are much more frequent.

 

Well, it does have the advantage of putting a barrier between Houston and the rest of us, which can't be a bad thing. Now if they could just build one big enough to wall off all of Texas, we might really be onto something...

 

It makes anyone with half a brain in their head want to move away, and drives up the cost of living and doing business. Anyone with half a brain in their head would tell you to just build solar panels so that you get free energy during peak electricty demand for A/C but, again, everyone with half a brain in their head left Houston long ago.

In fact, it's difficult to see how it wouldn't make things dramatically worse - this is the equivalent of encasing the city in a huge greenhouse and I can't imagine it would be cheaper to air-condition that than the buildings themselves.

Right, and can you imagine how much fun a fire would be inside that thing? No fucking way I'd ever live in that deathtrap, even if it weren't in a hellhole like Houston. Smog would be awesome too - Houston is a commuter city after all.

Probably because Houston is, by default, inhabited exclusively by the sorts of half-wits that could be convinced that this is a good idea.

 

If we had the capability, the funds, the will to build such a monstrosity, there is no way in hell I would use it as a bell jar for the city of Houston. I would put it in North Dakota and plant a rainforest inside.

A hurricane would totally tear that shit up, subjecting it's citizens to falling debris. The cars would fill it with carbon monoxide. The greenhouse effect would bake everything inside. Any A/C unit capable of cooling this thing would consume so much energy, they would have nothing left over to run the actual city. Fossil fuel prices are going up and up.

It would make much more sense to build everything underground. This is an example of the hubris known as techno-triumphalism. It's the product of 50 years of dirt cheap energy. And it's just bad design. No one looks to the future and imagines it as a crappy city wrapped in plastic. No one walks around Houston in the summer, you drive your car to a garage and walk inside as quickly as possible. Therefore, the city isn't something that would be nice to walk around if only it were cooler.

This must be a joke. I hope it is.

 

Some minor points:

Many of the things that nature does for free would now need to be handled by man. With no rain falling, every drop of water for plants would have to come from the city's water supply. No rain to wash the dust, dirt and pigeon poop off the downtown streets. What about environmental impacts? Birds and other wildlife getting trapped. What about the soil? Texas soil contracts during droughts and cracks foundations and streets. People actually have to water their foundations here to prevent it during droughts.

Basically, it cause way more problems than it could solve.

 

Here's a better idea. Build a giant freezer over a lake. Then, when a hurricane is about to form, we drop the giant ice cube into the Atlantic Ocean using an army of dirigibles.

I could find no company or person who was willing to have their name attached to this "project", except the German company that makes plastic sheeting. I think this was invented completely by the Discovery Channel.

 

Ok...one positive note....with a big enough bowl and lighter...I could make the world's largest bong.

 

That gives new meaning to the term hot-box.

 

Not necessarily, if it is built correctly. It is hard but a closed environment is much easier to control. All you need to do is look at large buildings.