The Weather Report


By Jim Smith

Is it Global Warming, or just an unusually severe heat wave? Venice and much of the Northern Hemisphere have been sweltering in what is becoming the hottest year on record. Word on the street is that this summer's heat wave is definitely part of a worldwide climate change. Scientists may or may not agree.


In any case, global warming has become a fact a life for millions. But what's in it for Venice? Have you been to Ocean Front Walk at night lately? If the heat wave is still with us when you read this, turn off your TV and head down to the beach tonight. It's warm, but it feels good. Up until now, the Boardwalk at night has been deserted, except for those with no place to go. The few bars close at 10 or 11pm, even on weekends. Round midnight, the walk is as deserted as it was in broad daylight 30 years ago.

Fast forward a couple of years. It's midnight and pushing 80 degrees on the beach. A score of new bars are going strong. People are partying from Windward to Ozone. No more sleepy beach town. Suddenly, Venice is the hot new nightspot. There's even talk of building an open-air pavilion (again) for big name concerts. There are no more cold and dewy nights, Venice has gone tropical. Move over Miami Beach.

Now fast forward a few more years. The crowds of the beach have thinned out. But so has L.A. The price of water, an essential ingredient when you live in a desert, has skyrocketed. The freeways are still clogged, but with people cashing in their remaining gasoline ration tickets and moving north. Idaho and Montana never looked so good to sophisticated urbanites as they do these days. Having air conditioning and electricity only a few hours a day in three-digit heat, is having a chilling (pardon the pun) effect on those still living in the valleys and the Basin. You can forget about buying a small cabin in the surrounding mountains unless you have at least $10 million to spare.

A few years farther on. All good things must come to an end. As Greenland becomes - green - again, the water rises. When the piled up mountain of sand on the beach didn't keep the sea water out of Venice streets, they built a concrete sea wall. That worked for a while, although it ruined the view. When Antarctic ice began slipping away as well, the game was over.

Now sea level is a good 10 feet about the tops of those big ugly cubes they began building back in the 90s. There are a few hardy souls hanging out on Mar Vista Hill, around 4th street in Ocean Park and on the Playa del Rey bluffs. You can take an underwater sea cruise of old Venice, Playa Vista, and points "inland." They say it's the second biggest tourist attraction after the underwater tour of Disneyland.

The good new is that with the reduced amount of economic activity and carbon dioxide being released into the atmosphere, the sea level will begin to fall. Venice will be its old self, in, oh, about 10,000 years.

Posted: Tue - August 1, 2006 at 03:21 PM          


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