Scottie, Beam Me Up to the Polar City!

Deng Cheng-hong's depiction of a model "polar city", circa year 2500 A.D. Polar cities are an adaptation concept for future generations living on a ravaged planet long after those of us doing the ravaging have said goodbye.

It's also certainly interesting to note that this concept isn't that far out there either. Although in the 70s and 80s we were sold The Jetzens and Star Trek-like visions of the future, none of us have a flying car yet, and hello, it's like, 2008 already! So, it seems reasonable to imagine that with the flood of news related to peak oil and other environmental limitations, including a bunch of wild cards yet to be dealt by global warming, our offspring may be living in the poles while we will never own a flying car or be beemed up anywhere within our lifetimes. It seems even more reasonable to wonder if the recent opening of the seedbank in Svalbard, where "Norway blasted the...Vault deep into the permafrost of a remote Arctic archipelago to protect as many as 4.5 million of the world's agricultural seeds from climate change, plant epidemics, natural disasters or war," couldn't be the very first stones cast as the foundations for these future milieus.

If you've got the time, there is a wealth of information on polar cities in the comments section, as well as some provocative debate on the global warming issue.