In Greece, Developers Eye Scorched Peloponnese

Travel Blog • Joanna Kakissis • 09.20.07 | 12:25 PM ET

We mentioned in an earlier post that greedy developers of tourism resorts may have had a hand in Greece’s devastating and deadly fires last month. Alas, the reports we pointed to were right. Just days after the ruling New Democracy party eked out an election victory, its leaders gave property developers the go-ahead to build hotels and other facilities on an environmentally fragile area cleared by the fires, writes Elinda Labropoulou in The Independent.

Since Greece has no land or forest registry, and since forestland cannot be rezoned as buildable land, developers have for decades hired arsonists to burn away the forests so they can build on the land illegally. Prime Minister Costas Karamanlis—whose government tried to deflect pre-election criticism by scaring the public and blaming the fires on terrorism—promised that such exploitation wouldn’t happen this time.

The fires killed 67 people and destroyed nearly half a million acres of forest and farmland in the western Peloponnese and the once-lush island of Evia. The just-approved development is set for a coveted coastal zone in Zaharo, where nearly half of the deaths occurred. “It also includes a rare pine forest, thermal springs and a nesting area for the endangered loggerhead turtle Caretta-Caretta,” Labropoulou writes.

This summer was the worst on record for fires in Greece. Huge chunks of forest around Athens, where I live, also turned to ash this summer. I got used to the sky turning brownish-gray with smoke as it rained ash on the streets. Those forests used to act as natural air conditioners for the city; now scientists have predicted that the already unbearable summer temperatures in Athens (um, 120 degrees hot enough for ya?) could rise further. Such a development could eventually make Athens a no-go zone in the summer and fuel even more arson-for-profit as people flee to the suburbs to escape the unbearable heat of the inner city.

While the mayor of Zacharo told The Independent that the new development “will fully respect the environment,” he’s virtually embracing the culture of arson-fueled development in Greece by going along with these plans. Considering that swathes of the western Peloponnese and Evia are burnt to moonscapes and that the once-gorgeous area around ancient Olympia is destroyed, I was hoping the Greeks would at last realize that saving this country’s extensive natural beauty will keep their country from eventually turning into a theme-park shadow of itself. But after driving through the Peloponnese recently—along a road that was once lush with olive groves and bouquets of yellow wildflowers—I saw the dead land and almost wept in defeat.

Photo by Joanna Kakissis.