The water of our blue planet was mostly an ill green as I recall based on 1980s memories of sliding around the lesser waterparks of South Dakota, Kansas, Nevada, and other places that made their way onto the itineraries of childhood vacation road trips. There was one in particular, etched onto a hillside in the Black Hills, that seemed to have no business there. Just a few slides, and one of those simulated whitewater things that my step-brother literally flew out of onto an embankment. It had some luge-style slides that could unnaturally move a stomach upwards in the abdomen well enough, but none of the straight-down, wet freefall madness of the big deal parks of today affiliated with Six Flags and the like.One of those monstrosities, the planned Waveyard in Arizona — America’s fake water wonderland — will use its own water treatment system, but will still lose around 100 million gallons of water a year to evaporation. Plus it takes 50 million just to fill it up. It all comes from area groundwater — yes, the flush groundwater supplies of desert Arizona. It’s actually not all that bad compared to, say, a golf course. But, like a golf course, a water park is about the peak of American environmental bubbledom, where technology can make your wildest wet dreams come true — even, say, surfing in the desert. And you’ll notice an interesting tone if you chew through the Waveyard website, a certain because we fucking can.Read the rest at Motherboard.
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