Domed Cities

It may sound like something out of science fiction (or Phantasy Star Adventure), but some engineers are working on a plan to create a giant dome over a city in real life. It's a plan in the works for Houston, Texas. You can read about it and see some video clips here. Supposedly, this dome would protect the city from all kinds of weather, such as hurricanes and rising temperatures.

What do you think about this concept? Would you want to live in a domed city like this? If it works out well in Houston, it would probably be applied in other places as well. I doubt something like this would be constructed in the near future, but one day this aspect of science fiction may become science reality.

Sounds pretty cool...it's about time that we move forward and achieve what Science Fiction has laid out for it's stories. Been playing Bioshock recently and I'm completely fascinated with an underwater city.

Well, that does sound interesting and certainly like something out of a sci-fi movie. I just wonder if they could really pull it off. I have no doubt that we will probably find out one day not too far in the future and if it does well in one city, there will probably be more cities that adopt it as well.

My first thought is that it would make me totally claustrophobic. I don't like closed in spaces very much.

That's an interesting point, Silver, regarding claustrophobia. This would probably trigger that for many people, even though the dome would be quite large. It's supposed to be the largest building in the world, but having it overhead, cutting off some of the sunlight and sky view, would be a difficult adapting situation for many.

Thinking about this more today, I also realized that there's a major flaw in the plan. The dome would essentially stop all air traffic into the city. I'm not sure if there's an airport inside Houston or not, but it has to have several hospitals. It would be impossible to fly anyone into the city for emergency medical treatment with the dome in place.