Comment by londons_explore
5 years ago
I'd be interested to see the distribution of amounts of sand stolen per person.
If 10% of people steal a shot-glass of sand as a momento from a beach 100 meters X 100 meters which has 1000 daily visitors, the sand goes down 1cm every hundred years, which is waay slower than sealevel rise.
If people start taking sackfulls home, the balance changes quickly though.
usually, there are pictures in the articles with images of the stolen sand.
The majority of time is not a shot-glass, but more like a bottle.
Here some pictures:
https://www.ilmessaggero.it/photogallery_img/MED/31/07/44531... https://www.repstatic.it/content/nazionale/img/2019/04/26/11... https://filecdn.nonsprecare.it/wp-content/uploads/2016/09/FU... https://www.gelestatic.it/thimg/xdU2x4YwGfNp33fZp0ePMCBh38M=... https://trekking.it/wp-content/uploads/2016/02/copertina1-10...
A shot-glass is around the tolerable level because it's the amount of sand you find in your shorts when you are back home from the beach.
Whatever department manages the beaches should insert themselves into this practice to moderate it. Sell pretty glass display bottles that are more attractive than a bag or soda bottle, but happen to be tiny. This wouldn't work if it inspired enough people to start collecting to outweigh the savings from intervention.
99% of the beaches are unmoderated (is an island so we have a lot of them). Tourists are usually caught at the airport or boarding the ferry (only 2 ways for leaving the island). Sometimes they are also spotted while they steal sand on the beach by the locals, that stops them and call the police.
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