Monthly Archives: July 2017

For me its the summer of heaven, said Reid Pauyo, 53.

Pauyo was sitting contentedly last Thursday atop the new rush hour ferry from 34th Street to Glen Cove, Long Island. The Stevie Wonder song Dont you worry bout a thing was playing softly over speakers on the enclosed top deck. The bluffs and beaches of Great Neck and Port Washington breezed by, the lights of the Gatsby mansions just winking on. Pauyo gestured magnanimously. He was the only person in the echoing compartment.

With necessary Amtrak repairs causing what Gov. Andrew Cuomo called a summer of hell now upon us, the MTA has been challenged to make life as un-miserable as possible for commuters traveling into and out of the city in the face of canceled or rerouted LIRR trains. Alternative travel plans were drawn up, including the temporary four-times-daily ferry. The hellscape started a week ago, and then: mostly nothing.

New York City-bound trains were more crowded than usual last week. There were confused Long Islanders rerouted to Atlantic Terminal in Brooklyn, but few nightmares yet. Riders are MTA-trained enough to know that things could get worse, dispensation provided by wise preparation and the fact that Penn Station work is only beginning. But while they wait for the other shoe to drop (maybe its dropping as you read), the Glen Cove ferrygoers were enjoying their unexpected ride all 35 or so on the boat built for more than 200.

Raj Wakhale of Huntington, for example, was sitting good-humoredly on the open deck despite a slight drizzle. Nursing a beer and toasting the landscape, he praised the spaciousness compared to the usual squeezing on the train. You werent sweating on the guy next to you or smelling his beer. He said there had been free food at the Glen Cove Ferry terminal in the morning. Im sure were paying for it somehow, allowed Wakhale, 48.

For Pauyo, the Glen Cove resident enjoying his solitude out of the rain, the boat actually made his commute much easier. His office is right next to the Wall Street drop-off for the morning ferry. Couldnt be easier.

That may not be true for the many who find the ride too long or inconvenient factors in the dampening of demand for the Glen Cove-Manhattan ferry, which has been an elusive goal for decades. Another factor: potential unreliability, as was the case on Friday when two of the four runs were cancelled due to morning engine problems.

Pauyo says the better way to make ferry service sustainable is similar to what the MTA was forced to do this summer: use the bounty of NYs waterways and create an alternative to the train, not a replacement. Then price and size the boats for demand, and re-format the ride to make it competitively pleasant (Pauyo is, you may have guessed, a banker). He said there were easy ways to spruce up the ferry, one of a varied fleet the MTA is using have more outdoor seating, for example, perhaps flat screen TVs or outlets for your phone. At the moment, the enclosed deck sported only a sad string of party lights and a single wilted houseplant.

The alternative transportation strategy is similar to what Mayor Bill de Blasio is trying in the city with a ferry service that launched this spring. Because each boat has about the capacity of a single subway car the system wont a replacement for other modes of transportation. But its certainly pleasant during warm months, particularly when compared with the subways, whose burden it might ease.

In some ways, subway riders are having a truer summer from hell this year, with delays and malfunctions abounding. Ferrygoers generally knew how lucky they had it last week, a much nicer experience than LIRR or subway riders faced. Glen Cove Deputy Mayor Barbara Peebles, a longtime ferry advocate, says shes not surprised to hear about the good experiences, though she had expected many more commuters to try the option even with the limited schedule.

She says she went to sleep the night before launch day thinking were gonna need a bigger boat.

They didnt, and what she hopes will become a popular permanent ferry is off to a slow start. But maybe people will eventually be drawn by a potentially not-so-hellish season on the waves.

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'Summer of hell?' Not on the high seas - amNY

Summertime. Vacation time. No time to let your guard down. Traditionally, crime goes up during warmer weather, with property crimes and aggravated assaults on the rise. In some locations, murder rates increase, too. When temperatures rise, there are more windows left open, more sweaty and irritated people seeking relief outside, and more alcoholic beverages consumed in public, all of which can prompt bad behavior.

Maybe you and your family have decided to take an ocean cruise to get away from it all this summer. Well, beware, because there is crime on the high seas, too sometimes violent crime. And consider this: A vessel might be registered in the Bahamas, headquartered in Miami, traveling in international waters and carrying passengers from any number of foreign countries, so law enforcement jurisdiction is murky.

If the ship departs from, say, Florida, and a crime is committed onboard, the local police might investigate once the cruise liner returns to port. The feds have jurisdiction if a crime has occurred against a U.S. national on a ship that has departed or will arrive back in the States. The FBI might be assigned to investigate. But these professionals will be days removed from when the crime was committed. Every detective will tell you that evidence gathered immediately following a crime is often crucial to prosecution.

The cruise industry says it caters to more than 24 million customers each year and that crime rates on board one of those massive floating hotels is a small fraction of the comparable rates of crime on land.

But on dry land, you can immediately call 911 for help. You likely have a cop shop a few minutes driving distance from your location and a fully equipped hospital nearby. On a cruise ship, perhaps hundreds of miles out at sea, youve got well, youve got whatever the ship has to offer.

An official with the Cruise Lines International Association insists there is robust security onboard to assure passengers are safe. But lets get real: Any security officers are working for the cruise line, and their primary allegiance may not be to a victimized passenger. Their efforts gathering evidence, taking witness statements or tracking down suspects may be lacking.

NBC News has reported extensively on cruise line crime and calculated that of the 92 alleged crimes reported on cruise ships last year, 62 were sexual assaults. Im guessing here, but I bet the combination of hot temperatures and free-flowing booze tends to reduce passengers inhibitions. But most frightening is that a majority of the sexual assaults be they committed by crew members or passengers were never prosecuted. A congressional report from a few years ago found that minors were the victims in a third of those sexual assaults.

The dirty secret in the cruise line industry is that crime does occur on cruise ships and very often law enforcement isnt notified, evidence isnt preserved, people arent assisted, said Sen. Richard Blumenthal of Connecticut. He is sponsoring a bill in the U.S. Senate that would require cruise lines to report any claim of criminal activity to the FBI within four hours, turn over all video evidence, earmark cases in which youngsters are involved and include a federal officer called a sea marshal on each ship. Id like to add that each vessel be equipped with a proper evidentiary rape kit.

NBCs reporting included stories about victimized teenage girls, one of whom tried to commit suicide after she alleged that she was given alcohol and raped onboard a cruise to the Virgin Islands. Another teen interviewed claimed she was sexually assaulted by a crew member in the ships gym. Jim Walker, a Miami attorney, said his firm has represented many victims of alleged cruise ship crime, including one who was just 3 years old.

The average passenger load on an ocean liner is about 3,000. But some mega-cruise liners can hold up to 6,000. Whenever you get that many people in a finite space, lulled by adult activities over here and supervised children and youth activities over there, trouble can develop.

Im sure the cruise lines do their very best to fully vet and hire suitable employees. It would not be in their best interest to do otherwise. But this summer, if you are taking the family on a once-in-a-lifetime cruise to paradise, dont let your guard down. Have a wonderful vacation, but realize that crime can happen anywhere, and you and yours are not immune.

To find out more about Diane Dimond, visit her website at http://www.dianedimond.com.

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DIANE DIMOND: Be careful on the high seas - Examiner Enterprise

A crew of improbable New Zealand heroes was honored on a wintry July 11 with a parade that drew throngs of jubilant Kiwis to the streets of Wellington. Members of Emirates Team New Zealand (ETNZ) had just returned from Bermuda, where they had become the underdog winners of the America's Cup sailing race. Their victory over titleholders Oracle Team USA was sweet redemption: ETNZ had blown a commanding lead over Oracle in the 2013 competition. In this year's rematch, however, the relatively underfunded Kiwis parlayed a blend of skill and technological ingenuity to take down their rivals, lavishly backed by tech billionaire Larry Ellison. ETNZ's stunning win offers a chance to delve into the world of elite sailing, an international sport in which technology and innovation rule the seas and national identity is as slippery as a deck in a storm.

On the surface, sailing seems a decidedly anachronistic sport, conjuring images of a suntanned septuagenarian in Sperry Top-Siders. After all, the sail itself is an outmoded technology, and the grand prize of sport sailing the America's Cup is celebrated as the oldest trophy in sports. In reality, modern sailing keeps pace with Formula One in its cutting-edge design and the relentless pursuit of innovation, and the America's Cup has historically been contested by the best available vessels, be they schooners in the 1851 inaugural, sloops in the 1880s, the J-class in the 1930s, or the high-tech catamarans used today.

The race's constantly evolving technology is a result of what might be the most flexible and dynamic governing apparatus in all of sports. While there are a formal America's Cup committee and rule-making organs, the major dictates of each iteration of the race are largely up to the previous winner. That's right: The race location, vessel type and a slew of other rules and regulations are determined by the defending champions, who historically have been free to stack the deck in their favor. In years past, this led to a fairly one-sided competition, with the New York Yacht Club enjoying a streak of victories from 1851 through 1980. Perhaps unsurprisingly, the club's teams enjoyed the patronage of some wealthy household names: J.P. Morgan, Ted Turner and a variety of Vanderbilts. In an effort to spread the appeal of the sport in recent times, the competition has been made slightly more egalitarian, but titleholders still hold a considerable edge; only one team has ever failed to repeat its victory at least once.

Ellison, the founder of the Oracle brand and the eponymous sailing team, has emerged as an interesting standard-bearer for the sport: He spends relentlessly in the pursuit of victory but has also endorsed rules and structures to help grow sailboat racing beyond its traditional audience. At the defending Oracle team's direction, the 2013 Cup races were held in San Francisco Bay, bringing the action closer to spectators on the shore. That series also saw the introduction of the catamaran-style vessels that have nearly quadrupled racing speeds. Ellison's team staged its impressive, come-from-behind victory that year. Its run of eight straight wins to clinch a 9-8 triumph garnered a good deal of extra media attention for the race and the sport.

Following its 2013 heartbreak, ETNZ appears to have pulled out all the stops en route to a resounding defeat of Ellison's squad in June. The Kiwis' most novel innovation was to install a set of hydraulic power-generating stationary bicycles in their boat to replace the traditional hand-cranked systems that have long been the norm. This made for curious viewing: To casual spectators, it looked as if the boats were paddle-driven by cyclists. Of course, this was not the case, but the bicycle system gave the team massive gains in efficiency while literally freeing up hands on deck. It had been developed under a shroud of secrecy and unveiled only a few months before the competition; only one other team attempted to install a similar setup. ETNZ also relied on some of the sport's most sophisticated data systems, using a blend of telemetry, GPS and drone footage to gain every possible advantage.

Naturally, the boats don't sail themselves, and the ETNZ sailors, under the leadership of skipper Glenn Ashby and helmsman Peter Burling, emerged as the competition's most capable group in terms of foiling. This occurs when the catamaran builds up enough speed that the craft's twin hydrofoils raise the main hull out of the water. The hydrofoils, in turn, reduce friction with the water enough to push the boat to speeds that can exceed those of the wind. The New Zealanders' advantage in foiling came in part because they were the first to employ the approach. New Zealand relied on a shrewd interpretation of the race's rules in 2013 to pioneer foiling, which has quickly become a standard technique across the sport. Between its clandestine innovation and rule-pushing tactics, the upstart squad bested the field in the qualification rounds this year and cruised to a 7-1 victory over Oracle in the final race series.

The relatively open competitive structures also lead to interesting moments of collaboration, rivalry and subterfuge that are matched only by professional wrestling. After the Italian Luna Rossa syndicate, challengers to ETNZ for the next cup, withdrew from this year's race in protest of the reduction and standardization of vessel size, it turned over some of its resources to ETNZ in the process. After the ETNZ boat capsized during the qualifying tournament, the team reached out to Groupama Team France, which had already been eliminated, for support and equipment. The French initially refused (allegedly at the urging of Oracle), then promised help in exchange for a payment of 300,000 euros before withdrawing the offer.

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The America's Cup: A High Seas Expression of Pure Capitalism - STRATFOR

Environment Indias stress on protecting the high-seas freedoms in conservation dialogues seems to stem from our ambition of being a major player in deep-seabed mining.

The high seas now suffer from an unrestrained use of resources in the face of several tedious regulations, the lack of a strong institutional framework and reluctant political will. Credit: Kanenori/pixabay

The oceans contain it all: life, biodiversity, energy resources, genetic resources and theyre amongthe biggest carbon sinks on the planet. This is why its almost silly thattheir importance has to be reiterated before pressing for theirconservation. The Indian Ocean in particular is also a vast reservoir of economic resources: off-shore oil, fish stock and rich marine biodiversity. Unfortunately, itis also one of the dirtiest oceans in the world, polluted by plastic debris and chemical runoff.

Under international law, a countrys sovereignty the exclusive economic zone where a country exercises itsjurisdiction goes upto 200 nautical miles (around 370 km) from its coastal baseline.Thismeans that thenationgoverns this area as it governs its landmass. The effective governance of a natural resource, which includes the oceans, should thus ideally be a balance between its utilisationand conservation.

Beyond the thresholdof a countrys territorial sovereignty at sea, the waters are deemed international and commonly called the high seas, or areas beyond national jurisdiction (ABNJ), where no individual country can exercise itsexclusive rights. This distinction is merely legal; in the natural world, there are no borders. What happens beyond 200 nautical miles affects what happens within it, and vice-versa. Previously, this hasnt beena problem, but the high seas now suffer from an unrestrained use of resources in the face of several tediousregulations, the lack of a strong institutional framework and reluctant political will.

Now, the UN Convention on the Law of the Sea (UNCLOS) is awidely ratified treatywith 150 members. And the treatment of the high seas under UNCLOS has traditionally been centred onthe freedoms that nations haveto exploit the high seas. This could be by enabling them tofish, navigate, lay submarine cables or pipelines, etc. in the ABNJ. Eventually, however, the international community started to realisethat the member nations were over-exploiting the resources and that they had set the health of the high season a decline. After years of negotiations, in 2015, the UN adopted a resolution to develop a legally binding treaty for the conservation of marine life beyond national territorial waters. This forthcoming treaty is an international legally binding instrument (ILBI) in negotiations.

The main idea of negotiating anILBI is to detail proposals of the elements that could comprise the treaty, such as conservation measures, environmental impact assessments and its components, marine genetic resources, capacity-building and the transfer of marine technology. This at leastconcerns the conservation side of living marine resources. However, international law under the UNCLOS, by virtue of the ILBI, is now making a distinction between living and non-living marine resources. While the conservation of living resources is being negotiated under the ILBI, the International Seabed Authority (ISA) is the regulatory body in charge of granting licenses to nationsfor exploiting the deep seabed for non-living marine resources.

Indias stand in the meetings on the ILBI has been off-handed;the representativeshave been repeatingthe basic tenants of environmental law such as the need to uphold principles of international law, need for oceanic conservation, etc. Wehave been stressing constantly on not compromising freedoms on the high-seas. In a nutshell, as far as the high seas go, Indias stand in ILBI negotiations is that:

On the other hand, our presence in the ISA has beenmore pronounced. Indias stress on protecting the high-seas freedoms in conservation dialogues seems to stem from our ambition of being a major player in deep-seabed mining. In one of the three deep-seabed exploration areas currently permitted by international law, China, South Korea, Germany and India are among the countriesprospecting for polymetallic nodules and sulphides (in the Central Indian basin). While the regime for the extractionof metals and minerals is more or less well-defined, the regulation of living resources in the high seas is stillunder consideration.

Understanding that, as a developing country, India cannot curb resource-exploitation in keeping with our needs present and future it would still be safe to say that India is a dominant power bordering the Indian Ocean in southern and southeast Asia, and our stand both national and international counts.

The India Foundation is organising an Indian Ocean Conference in August 2017 with several countries of the relevant region to discuss its governance. The organising committee (according to the programme) has many officials fromthe Ministry of External Affairs. But it is strange to note that there is no representation from the Ministry of Earth Sciences, which is in charge of governing the oceans forIndia. So it appears as if the only job of this ministryis to obtain licenses to exploit marine resources globally. The About us section on their websitecontains these lines:The Ministry also deals with science and technology for exploration and exploitation of ocean resources (living and non-living), and play nodal role for Antarctic/Arctic and Southern Ocean research.This is probably an inadvertently honest declaration of what Indias plan is for governing the oceans: exploitation without conservation.

We cannot expect to use upnon-living resources without playing an active role in protecting the high-seas marine ecosystem. We cant in the long run talk about peace and prosperity if addressing marine pollution is not on our agenda. Most oceans conservation programmes are under climate change research and pertain to the Indian coastline and limited fish resources. We seem to not be having any discussion on protecting marine biodiversity or marine genetic resources or high-seas governance at all, for that matter. Balancingthe utilisationand the protection of a resource is complex and there are no easy answers. However, thisis precisely why we need more academic and public engagement onthe topic within India.

Ipshita Chaturvediis an alumna of the West Bengal National University of Juridical Sciences and the University of Melbourne. She works for a think-tank in Mumbai.

Categories: Environment, Featured, South Asia

Tagged as: benefit sharing, high seas, Indian Ocean, International Seabed Authority, marine biodiversity, marine genetic resources, Ministry of Earth Sciences, Ministry of External Affairs, seabed mining, UNCLOS

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If India Won't Work to Conserve Our Oceanic Resources, Peace Can't Be on Its Agenda - The Wire