War Graves Could be Bulldozed to Make Way for Motorway
.............in Belgium
Story filed: 12:02 Saturday 8th December 2001
From: www.ananova.com/news/story/sm_468586.html
So how come they are building motorways anyway - haven't they got enough?
Great Britain has 3,200 km of motorway (and plans to build a further 105 km)
Belgium ....... which ha[s] much less land area than the UK, ha[s] 1,666 km
Great Britain has 15,400 km of National Roads
Even tiny Belgium, with a much smaller land area, has 12, 750 km of National Road.
From: www.abd.org.uk/trd-abd.htm
So why on earth do they need more?!
And we are eight times as big, and six times as populous.
Where on earth are they going to fit it. The country must be completely tarmac'd over already. We nearly are!
Piers :-]
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I feel this person could find a more appropriate, anti-motoring, site. I have e-mailed him to this effect.
Tomo
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By the way, these wars, we were told, were fought for FREEDOM. There was more freedom on the roads under Hitler (he was not quie as bad as Stalin, or his "democratic" successors).
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Piers writes that this country must be completely tarmaced over already. The actual figure is 3%. And what the Belgians build is their own business.
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How many cars per capita does the UK have ?
How much has that changed in the last [say] 10 years ?
How does that compare to the increase in tarmac over the same period ?
How do those figures compare with other countries ?
It always used to be said that 12000 miles p.a. was average. Is that still true ?
And unrelated, but stuff I wonder......
What's the average age of a car in the UK ?
How has that changed in the last [say] 10 years ?
What percentage of income is spent on an average car now caompared to 10 years ago ?
M.
p.s. I know, but its too hot to sleep...
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"Too hot to sleep" Mark, have you tried turning your electric blanket off and turning down the thermostat on your central heating:):):):)
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If you can't sleep why don'tyou go and look for the pool thermometer - if nothing else it will give you something to do. I can't sleep 'cos it too cold and er, 9am in the morning.
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I don't see what you can't get a refrigeration blanket. Surely you could pass cold water through the thing ?
Aircon on max, ceiling fan turning so fast the roof is likely to lift off, so much air current I'm pinned to the floor and I'm still too damn hot !!
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Belgium may be small but it is, unfortunately, on the way to lots of other bigger places.
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Those poor guys have probably already been moved once.
Maybe this is an opptunity to bring a few of them home and bury them in the UK...
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Humans are too clever for their own good.
We have spread too far.
Any part of the World where it is too cold to wear shorts for the whole year or any part where air conditioning is require should be declared uninhabitable.
Question is, what do you do with five billion surplus people?
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Move to Santiago, Chile.
Its only too cold for shorts for about a month, if that, and air-conditioning is not required due to the lack of humidity.
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Mark (Brazil)
The UK has one car for every 2.1 of its population, which is the European average. That amounts to 28 million vehicles.
Car ownership in the UK is lower than Luxemburg (one to 1.6); Italy (one to 1.8) and Germany (one to 1.9).
Greece is the lowest in the EU, at one to 4.1.
ATB
Brian
(I'll seriously consider Santiago when I am rich).
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A large percentage of these graves are for other nationalities such as americans or even unnamed, so moving the graves is not a real possibility.
Seems wrong to disturb the resting place of these brave men just to make way for a road.Perhaps the Belgium goverment should contemplate just what their country would be like now if these soldiers had not liberated Belgium not so long ago.
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Steve G wrote:
>
> A large percentage of these graves are for other
> nationalities such as americans or even unnamed, so moving
> the graves is not a real possibility.
I can't begin to contemplate how they would have felt but I'd have thought being buried in their native country would be preferable to them...
As you say, some will be unknown.
These poor lads will already have been moved once. The bodies of US WW2 dead were all repatriated.
> Seems wrong to disturb the resting place of these brave men
> just to make way for a road. Perhaps the Belgium goverment
> should contemplate just what their country would be like now
> if these soldiers had not liberated Belgium not so long ago.
While this is all true. I still say the bodies could be moved with the utmost respect to a more suitable location. If an oppotunity could be taken to repatriate *some* of the dead that would be a significant advantage. Many war graves have been moved by the WGC for practical reasons.
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That's currently in the pipeline as well. Large UK, American & German cemetries are currently on the site of a third Paris airport, north of the city to allow Air France to compete with KLM by offering people in the Benelux countries an alternative to Schipol for long haul. As the man says below, perhaps the French should consider what their country would have been like without the sacrifice of those buried there.
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At Southend (Essex) they are proposing to move a whole church 150 yards to create a safety zone for a proposed expansion of the airport.
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Ahhh Southend airport. Happy memories...
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Bristol Box Freighters.
Now there's a name to conjour with!
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The church has only been there for about 900 years, all this is to create a 450m safety zone around the end of the runway due to new CAA rules for operating the size of planes required to make the airport profitable. What no-one seems to have picked up on yet is that the Royal Bank of Scotland is planning to build a new credit card centre about 600m from the end of the runway, directly under the flightline, which will employ about 2000 workers!
If there's a danger to the church being there, use about 5 hours a week, then I don't think I would feel happy working for RBS!!!
By the way Brian, remember the Carvair? How the hell did that fly???
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"I may disagree with your opinion, but I will defend to the death ....."
I don't take A Piers Green's rather wayward view on this topic but don't see why he should be required to express it only on an anti-motoring website. What's the point of that, Tomo?
'Bulldozing' is a Daily Mail headline way of putting this proposal. I too am sure it would be carried out in a sensitive manner. However I find it deeply depressing that moving graves for these purposes should receive even a moment's consideration.
Whilst it is certainly the case that some have been moved already, this was undertaken soon after the two wars for purely practical reasons - many had been buried in tiny groups or even singly (particularly during the war of 1914-1918). Having to move a few of these men once doesn't seem to me to be any justification for shifting them again solely for the convenience of travellers.
As regards bringing any back to UK or wherever, the decision was taken before the end of the First World War, rightly or wrongly but generally accepted, that they would be buried as near as possible to where they fell. It is inconceivable that a change of this CWGC policy could now be justified. It happens that the USA took a slightly differing view.
Finally, concerning "what the Belgians build is their own business", let's not forget, Tom, that the Belgians and the French were both so grateful for being liberated that they ceded the lands for these cemeteries "in perpetuity". True! (It's arguable, therefore, that technically the land does not belong to them anyway). A considerable gift, certainly. But memory fades ...
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>I don't take A Piers Green's rather wayward view on this topic but don't see why he should be required to express it only on an anti-motoring website. >What's the point of that, Tomo
Because A Piers Freen is IO is Bogush and Tomo believes this site doesn't allow the correct views to be expressed, etc. etc. etc. - you get the idea.
Its all desperately clever and witty.
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Ahhhhhhhhhh
But who would have read it if bogush had posted it?
And would people have reacted in the same way!
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Even the large war cemeteries do not extend very far. What about a [deep] tunnel?
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