Sometimes it\u2019s a mega project like the detonation of an atomic bomb or the construction of a hydroelectric\u00a0dam; sometimes, you\u2019re just blocking a castle\u2019s view. These five coastal villages each had a different reason to pick up and move in toto.<\/p>\n
In 1743, the 3rd Duke of Argyll\u2019s project of building a grand new castle\u2014complete with soaring towers, 6.5 hectares of garden, and, at 21 meters, Scotland\u2019s highest ceiling\u2014hit a snag. The shabby town of Inveraray was too close, obstructing the grandiose grounds and the view of Loch Fyne. So the duke dealt with this 18th-century version of a First World problem decisively: he commissioned plans to move the town. Luckily, the story ends well for the townspeople. The new Inveraray, relocated just down the shore, had a new pier and better housing. The pier proved especially lucrative, letting Inveraray take part in the growing herring industry.<\/p>\n
The Japanese know<\/em> tsunamis. After all, it\u2019s their word. Ancient coast dwellers left engraved \u201ctsunami stones\u201d along the shore, some warning future generations of the high point of past deluges. But old warnings lose their impact and, one evening in 1896, a tsunami eight stories high killed more than 20,000 people. Afterward, the residents of Yoshihama, one devastated village, heeded the ancients and moved their village up a nearby hill. The job took decades, but it paid off. In 2011, the massive T\u014dhoku tsunami struck. Along the coast, more than 18,000 people died, but in Yoshihama only the seawall, the seaside fish market, and a few homes were damaged.<\/p>\n In 1946, the United States had invented the biggest atomic bombs in existence and remote Bikini Atoll was a perfect testing ground\u2014except for its 167 residents. Commodore Ben Wyatt, the Marshall Islands\u2019 military governor, came to the not-quite-deserted atoll to request that Bikinians temporarily relocate for \u201cthe good of mankind and to end all world wars.\u201d After much debate they packed their belongings, as well as bits of their church and council house. They suffered lean years on smaller, food-scarce atolls before settling on nearby Kili Island. Almost 70 years on, the move seems permanent. In 2012, the United Nations noted that the Marshall Islands had \u201cnear-irreversible \u2026 contamination.\u201d<\/p>\n Mega projects tend to proceed despite protests from mini villages, and Quebec\u2019s multi-billion-dollar James Bay hydroelectric project was no exception. It promised abundant hydroelectricity by diverting several rivers into one\u2014the La Grande. For Fort George, an island community in the La Grande\u2019s mouth, rising waters created dangerous ground. The provincial government advised moving, but the residents\u2014primarily the Cree Nation of Chisasibi\u2014had deep roots; generations were buried in the island\u2019s cemeteries. Finally, after bitter deliberation, the village consented. It moved to the mainland in 1980 where it was renamed Chisasibi. Villagers still gather on the island each summer for the Mamoweedow Minstuksh festival.<\/p>\n River deltas shift as watercourses change. Delta residents know this, but cyclones can shift things too far. In 2010, Cyclone Phet swamped Phirt, a fishing village in Pakistan\u2019s Indus Delta. The storm badly eroded the muddy ground and, even after residents rebuilt their homes, the village kept flooding, forcing Phirt\u2019s 30 or so households to move a kilometer upstream. It may not be their last move. The sea has swallowed Phirt and more than half of the 42 villages that share its district. Upstream dams keep sediment from replenishing the delta, and, combined with supercharged cyclones packing climate-change-induced punches, chronic erosion is shrinking the Indus.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" Build a dam, Sam. Set off a bomb, Dom. Block a view, Lou. There are at least 50 ways to move your coastal village, but we\u2019ve narrowed it down to five.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"featured_media":12827,"menu_order":0,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"om_disable_all_campaigns":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[],"acf":{"hero_video_url":null,"hero_video_caption":"","deck":"Build a dam, Sam. Set off a bomb, Dom. Block a view, Lou. There are at least 50 ways to move your coastal village, but we\u2019ve narrowed it down to five.","authors_group":[{"by_group":"Written and curated by","contributors_group":[15435]}],"word_count_override":"","podbean1":"","podbean2":"","redirect":"","geolocation":null,"related":[16747,16974],"twitterimage":19139,"facebookimage":19139,"twitterdescription":"","edited":"","factchecked":"","code":"","no_old_story_flag":[]},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short\/16746"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/custom_quick"}],"version-history":[{"count":4,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short\/16746\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":20168,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short\/16746\/revisions\/20168"}],"acf:post":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short\/16974"},{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/article-short\/16747"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/12827"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=16746"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=16746"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/hakaimagazine.com\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=16746"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}Bikini Atoll, Marshall Islands<\/h2>\n
Fort George, Canada<\/h2>\n
Phirt, Pakistan<\/h2>\n