document_title: Taiga

question_text: what climate type is associated with a coniferous or boreal forest biome

text: Taiga

text: Climate and geography

text: Taiga is the world's largest land biome, making up 29% of the world's forest cover.[3] The largest areas are located in Russia and Canada. The taiga is the terrestrial biome with the lowest annual average temperatures after the tundra and permanent ice caps. Extreme winter minimums in the northern taiga are typically lower than those of the tundra. The lowest reliably recorded temperatures in the Northern Hemisphere were recorded in the taiga of northeastern Russia. The taiga or boreal forest has a subarctic climate with very large temperature range between seasons, but the long and cold winter is the dominant feature. This climate is classified as Dfc, Dwc, Dsc, Dfd and Dwd in the Köppen climate classification scheme,[4] meaning that the short summer (24 h average 10 °C (50 °F) or more) lasts 1–3 months and always less than 4 months. In Siberian taiga the average temperature of the coldest month is between −6 °C (21 °F) and −50 °C (−58 °F).[5] There are also some much smaller areas grading towards the oceanic Cfc climate with milder winters, whilst the extreme south and (in Eurasia) west of the taiga reaches into humid continental climates (Dfb, Dwb) with longer summers. The mean annual temperature generally varies from -5 °C to 5 °C (23 °F to 41 °F),[6] but there are taiga areas in eastern Siberia and interior Alaska-Yukon where the mean annual reaches down to -10 °C (14 °F).[7][8] According to some sources, the boreal forest grades into a temperate mixed forest when mean annual temperature reaches about 3 °C (37 °F).[9] Discontinuous permafrost is found in areas with mean annual temperature below 0 °C, whilst in the Dfd and Dwd climate zones continuous permafrost occurs and restricts growth to very shallow-rooted trees like Siberian larch. The winters, with average temperatures below freezing, last five to seven months. Temperatures vary from −54 °C to 30 °C (-65 °F to 86 °F) throughout the whole year. The summers, while short, are generally warm and humid. In much of the taiga, -20 °C (-4 °F) would be a typical winter day temperature and 18 °C (64 °F) an average summer day.

text: The growing season, when the vegetation in the taiga comes alive, is usually slightly longer than the climatic definition of summer as the plants of the boreal biome have a lower threshold to trigger growth. In Canada, Scandinavia and Finland, the growing season is often estimated by using the period of the year when the 24-hour average temperature is +5 °C (41 °F) or more.[10] For the Taiga Plains in Canada, growing season varies from 80 to 150 days, and in the Taiga Shield from 100 to 140 days.[11] Some sources claim 130 days growing season as typical for the taiga.[12] Other sources mention that 50–100 frost-free days are characteristic.[13] Data for locations in southwest Yukon gives 80–120 frost-free days.[14] The closed canopy boreal forest in Kenozersky National Park near Plesetsk, Arkhangelsk Province, Russia, on average has 108 frost-free days.[15] The longest growing season is found in the smaller areas with oceanic influences; in coastal areas of Scandinavia and Finland, the growing season of the closed boreal forest can be 145–180 days.[16] The shortest growing season is found at the northern taiga–tundra ecotone, where the northern taiga forest no longer can grow and the tundra dominates the landscape when the growing season is down to 50–70 days,[17][18] and the 24-hr average of the warmest month of the year usually is 10 °C (50 °F) or less.[19] High latitudes mean that the sun does not rise far above the horizon, and less solar energy is received than further south. But the high latitude also ensures very long summer days, as the sun stays above the horizon nearly 20 hours each day, with only around 6 hours of daylight occurring in the dark winters, depending on latitude. The areas of the taiga inside the Arctic Circle have midnight sun in mid-summer and polar night in mid-winter.

text: The taiga experiences relatively low precipitation throughout the year (generally 200–750 mm annually, 1,000 mm in some areas), primarily as rain during the summer months, but also as fog and snow. This fog, especially predominant in low-lying areas during and after the thawing of frozen Arctic seas, means that sunshine is not abundant in the taiga even during the long summer days. As evaporation is consequently low for most of the year, precipitation exceeds evaporation, and is sufficient to sustain the dense vegetation growth. Snow may remain on the ground for as long as nine months in the northernmost extensions of the taiga ecozone.[22]

text: In general, taiga grows to the south of the 10 °C July isotherm, but occasionally as far north as the 9 °C (48 °F) July isotherm.[23] Rich in spruces, Scots pines in the western Siberian plain, the taiga is dominated by larch in Eastern Siberia, before returning to its original floristic richness on the Pacific shores. Two deciduous trees mingle throughout southern Siberia: birch and Populus tremula.[5]

text: The southern limit is more variable, depending on rainfall; taiga may be replaced by forest steppe south of the 15 °C (59 °F) July isotherm where rainfall is very low, but more typically extends south to the 18 °C (64 °F) July isotherm, and locally where rainfall is higher (notably in eastern Siberia and adjacent Outer Manchuria) south to the 20 °C (68 °F) July isotherm. In these warmer areas the taiga has higher species diversity, with more warmth-loving species such as Korean pine, Jezo spruce, and Manchurian fir, and merges gradually into mixed temperate forest or, more locally (on the Pacific Ocean coasts of North America and Asia), into coniferous temperate rainforests where oak and hornbeam appear and join the conifers, birch and Populus tremula.

text: The area currently classified as taiga in Europe and North America (except Alaska) was recently glaciated. As the glaciers receded they left depressions in the topography that have since filled with water, creating lakes and bogs (especially muskeg soil) found throughout the taiga.

text: In Sweden the taiga is associated with the Norrland terrain.[24]

text: Soils

text: Taiga soil tends to be young and poor in nutrients. It lacks the deep, organically enriched profile present in temperate deciduous forests.[25] The thinness of the soil is due largely to the cold, which hinders the development of soil and the ease with which plants can use its nutrients.[25] Fallen leaves and moss can remain on the forest floor for a long time in the cool, moist climate, which limits their organic contribution to the soil; acids from evergreen needles further leach the soil, creating spodosol, also known as podzol.[26] Since the soil is acidic due to the falling pine needles, the forest floor has only lichens and some mosses growing on it. In clearings in the forest and in areas with more boreal deciduous trees, there are more herbs and berries growing. Diversity of soil organisms in the boreal forest is high, comparable to the tropical rainforest.[27]

text: Flora

text: Since North America and Asia used to be connected by the Bering land bridge, a number of animal and plant species (more animals than plants) were able to colonize both continents and are distributed throughout the taiga biome (see Circumboreal Region). Others differ regionally, typically with each genus having several distinct species, each occupying different regions of the taiga. Taigas also have some small-leaved deciduous trees like birch, alder, willow, and poplar; mostly in areas escaping the most extreme winter cold. However, the Dahurian larch tolerates the coldest winters in the Northern Hemisphere in eastern Siberia. The very southernmost parts of the taiga may have trees such as oak, maple, elm and lime scattered among the conifers, and there is usually a gradual transition into a temperate mixed forest, such as the eastern forest-boreal transition of eastern Canada. In the interior of the continents with the driest climate, the boreal forests might grade into temperate grassland.

text: There are two major types of taiga. The southern part is the closed canopy forest, consisting of many closely spaced trees with mossy ground cover. In clearings in the forest, shrubs and wildflowers are common, such as the fireweed. The other type is the lichen woodland or sparse taiga, with trees that are farther-spaced and lichen ground cover; the latter is common in the northernmost taiga.[28] In the northernmost taiga the forest cover is not only more sparse, but often stunted in growth form; moreover, ice pruned asymmetric black spruce (in North America) are often seen, with diminished foliage on the windward side.[29] In Canada, Scandinavia and Finland, the boreal forest is usually divided into three subzones: The high boreal (north boreal) or taiga zone; the middle boreal (closed forest); and the southern boreal, a closed canopy boreal forest with some scattered temperate deciduous trees among the conifers,[30] such as maple, elm and oak. This southern boreal forest experiences the longest and warmest growing season of the biome, and in some regions (including Scandinavia, Finland and western Russia) this subzone is commonly used for agricultural purposes. The boreal forest is home to many types of berries; some are confined to the southern and middle closed boreal forest (such as wild strawberry and partridgeberry); others grow in most areas of the taiga (such as cranberry and cloudberry), and some can grow in both the taiga and the low arctic (southern part of) tundra (such as bilberry, bunchberry and lingonberry).

text: The forests of the taiga are largely coniferous, dominated by larch, spruce, fir and pine. The woodland mix varies according to geography and climate so for example the Eastern Canadian forests ecoregion of the higher elevations of the Laurentian Mountains and the northern Appalachian Mountains in Canada is dominated by balsam fir Abies balsamea, while further north the Eastern Canadian Shield taiga of northern Quebec and Labrador is notably black spruce Picea mariana and tamarack larch Larix laricina.

text: Evergreen species in the taiga (spruce, fir, and pine) have a number of adaptations specifically for survival in harsh taiga winters, although larch, the most cold-tolerant of all trees,[citation needed] is deciduous. Taiga trees tend to have shallow roots to take advantage of the thin soils, while many of them seasonally alter their biochemistry to make them more resistant to freezing, called "hardening".[31] The narrow conical shape of northern conifers, and their downward-drooping limbs, also help them shed snow.[31]

text: Because the sun is low in the horizon for most of the year, it is difficult for plants to generate energy from photosynthesis. Pine, spruce and fir do not lose their leaves seasonally and are able to photosynthesize with their older leaves in late winter and spring when light is good but temperatures are still too low for new growth to commence. The adaptation of evergreen needles limits the water lost due to transpiration and their dark green color increases their absorption of sunlight. Although precipitation is not a limiting factor, the ground freezes during the winter months and plant roots are unable to absorb water, so desiccation can be a severe problem in late winter for evergreens.

text: Although the taiga is dominated by coniferous forests, some broadleaf trees also occur, notably birch, aspen, willow, and rowan. Many smaller herbaceous plants, such as ferns and occasionally ramps grow closer to the ground. Periodic stand-replacing wildfires (with return times of between 20–200 years) clear out the tree canopies, allowing sunlight to invigorate new growth on the forest floor. For some species, wildfires are a necessary part of the life cycle in the taiga; some, e.g. jack pine have cones which only open to release their seed after a fire, dispersing their seeds onto the newly cleared ground; certain species of fungi (such as morels) are also known to do this. Grasses grow wherever they can find a patch of sun, and mosses and lichens thrive on the damp ground and on the sides of tree trunks. In comparison with other biomes, however, the taiga has low biological diversity.

text: Coniferous trees are the dominant plants of the taiga biome. A very few species in four main genera are found: the evergreen spruce, fir and pine, and the deciduous larch. In North America, one or two species of fir and one or two species of spruce are dominant. Across Scandinavia and western Russia, the Scots pine is a common component of the taiga, while taiga of the Russian Far East and Mongolia is dominated by larch.

text: Fauna

text: The boreal forest, or taiga, supports a relatively small range of animals due to the harshness of the climate. Canada's boreal forest includes 85 species of mammals, 130 species of fish, and an estimated 32,000 species of insects.[32] Insects play a critical role as pollinators, decomposers, and as a part of the food web. Many nesting birds rely on them for food in the summer months. The cold winters and short summers make the taiga a challenging biome for reptiles and amphibians, which depend on environmental conditions to regulate their body temperatures, and there are only a few species in the boreal forest including red-sided garter snake, common European adder, blue-spotted salamander, northern two-lined salamander, Siberian salamander, wood frog, northern leopard frog, boreal chorus frog, American toad, and Canadian toad. Most hibernate underground in winter. Fish of the taiga must be able to withstand cold water conditions and be able to adapt to life under ice-covered water. Species in the taiga include Alaska blackfish, northern pike, walleye, longnose sucker, white sucker, various species of cisco, lake whitefish, round whitefish, pygmy whitefish, Arctic lamprey, various grayling species, brook trout (including sea-run brook trout in the Hudson Bay area), chum salmon, Siberian taimen, lenok and lake chub.

text: The taiga is home to a number of large herbivorous mammals, such as moose and reindeer/caribou. Some areas of the more southern closed boreal forest also have populations of other deer species such as the elk (wapiti) and roe deer.[33][34] The largest animal in the taiga is the wood bison, found in northern Canada, Alaska and has been newly introduced into the Russian far-east.[35] Small mammals of the Taiga biome include rodent species including beaver, squirrel, North American porcupine and vole, as well as a small number of lagomorph species such as snowshoe hare and mountain hare. These species have adapted to survive the harsh winters in their native ranges. Some larger mammals, such as bears, eat heartily during the summer in order to gain weight, and then go into hibernation during the winter. Other animals have adapted layers of fur or feathers to insulate them from the cold. Predatory mammals of the taiga must be adapted to travel long distances in search of scattered prey or be able to supplement their diet with vegetation or other forms of food (such as raccoons). Mammalian predators of the taiga include Canada lynx, Eurasian lynx, stoat, Siberian weasel, least weasel, sable, American marten, North American river otter, European otter, American mink, wolverine, Asian badger, fisher, gray wolf, coyote, red fox, brown bear, American black bear, Asiatic black bear, polar bear (only small areas at the taiga - tundra ecotone) and Siberian tiger.

text: More than 300 species of birds have their nesting grounds in the taiga.[36] Siberian thrush, white-throated sparrow, and black-throated green warbler migrate to this habitat to take advantage of the long summer days and abundance of insects found around the numerous bogs and lakes. Of the 300 species of birds that summer in the taiga only 30 stay for the winter.[37] These are either carrion-feeding or large raptors that can take live mammal prey, including golden eagle, rough-legged buzzard (also known as the rough-legged hawk), and raven, or else seed-eating birds, including several species of grouse and crossbills.

text: Fire

text: Fire has been one of the most important factors shaping the composition and development of boreal forest stands (Rowe 1955);[38] it is the dominant stand-renewing disturbance through much of the Canadian boreal forest (Amiro et al. 2001).[39] The fire history that characterizes an ecosystem is its fire regime, which has 3 elements: (1) fire type and intensity (e.g., crown fires, severe surface fires, and light surface fires), (2) size of typical fires of significance, and (3) frequency or return intervals for specific land units (Heinselman 1981).[40] The average time within a fire regime to burn an area equivalent to the total area of an ecosystem is its fire rotation (Heinselman 1973)[41] or fire cycle (Van Wagner 1978).[42] However, as Heinselman (1981)[40] noted, each physiographic site tends to have its own return interval, so that some areas are skipped for long periods, while others might burn two-times or more often during a nominal fire rotation.

text: The dominant fire regime in the boreal forest is high-intensity crown fires or severe surface fires of very large size, often more than 10,000 ha, and sometimes more than 400,000 ha (Heinselman 1981).[40] Such fires kill entire stands. Fire rotations in the drier regions of western Canada and Alaska average 50–100 years, shorter than in the moister climates of eastern Canada, where they may average 200 years or more. Fire cycles also tend to be long near the tree line in the subarctic spruce-lichen woodlands. The longest cycles, possibly 300 years, probably occur in the western boreal in floodplain white spruce (Heinselman 1981).[40]

text: Amiro et al. (2001)[39] calculated the mean fire cycle for the period 1980 to 1999 in the Canadian boreal forest (including taiga) at 126 years. Increased fire activity has been predicted for western Canada, but parts of eastern Canada may experience less fire in future because of greater precipitation in a warmer climate (Flannigan et al. 1998).[43]

text: The mature boreal forest pattern in the south shows balsam fir dominant on well-drained sites in eastern Canada changing centrally and westward to a prominence of white spruce, with black spruce and tamarack forming the forests on peats, and with jack pine usually present on dry sites except in the extreme east, where it is absent (Rowe and Scotter 1973).[44] The effects of fires are inextricably woven into the patterns of vegetation on the landscape, which in the east favour black spruce, paper birch, and jack pine over balsam fir, and in the west give the advantage to aspen, jack pine, black spruce, and birch over white spruce. Many investigators have reported the ubiquity of charcoal under the forest floor and in the upper soil profile, e.g., La Roi (1967).[45] Charcoal in soils provided Bryson et al. (1965)[46] with clues about the forest history of an area 280 km north of the then current tree line at Ennadai Lake, District Keewatin, Northwest Territories.

text: Two lines of evidence support the thesis that fire has always been an integral factor in the boreal forest: (1) direct, eye-witness accounts and forest-fire statistics, and (2) indirect, circumstantial evidence based on the effects of fire, as well as on persisting indicators (Rowe and Scotter 1973).[44] The patchwork mosaic of forest stands in the boreal forest, typically with abrupt, irregular boundaries circumscribing homogenous stands, is indirect but compelling testimony to the role of fire in shaping the forest. The fact is that most boreal forest stands are less than 100 years old, and only in the rather few areas that have escaped burning are there stands of white spruce older than 250 years (Rowe and Scotter 1973).[44] The prevalence of fire-adaptive morphologic and reproductive characteristics of many boreal plant species is further evidence pointing to a long and intimate association with fire. Seven of the ten most common trees in the boreal forest—jack pine, lodgepole pine, aspen, balsam poplar (Populus balsamifera), paper birch, tamarack, black spruce—can be classed as pioneers in their adaptations for rapid invasion of open areas. White spruce shows some pioneering abilities, too, but is less able than black spruce and the pines to disperse seed at all seasons. Only balsam fir and alpine fir seem to be poorly adapted to reproduce after fire, as their cones disintegrate at maturity, leaving no seed in the crowns.

text: The oldest forests in the northwest boreal region, some older than 300 years, are of white spruce occurring as pure stands on moist floodplains (Rowe 1970).[47] Here, the frequency of fire is much less than on adjacent uplands dominated by pine, black spruce and aspen. In contrast, in the Cordilleran region, fire is most frequent in the valley bottoms, decreasing upward, as shown by a mosaic of young pioneer pine and broadleaf stands below, and older spruce–fir on the slopes above (Rowe and Scotter 1973).[44] Without fire, the boreal forest would become more and more homogeneous, with the long-lived white spruce gradually replacing pine, aspen, balsam poplar, and birch, and perhaps even black spruce, except on the peatlands (Raup and Denny 1950).[48]

text: Threats

text: Human activities

text: Large areas of Siberia's taiga have been harvested for lumber since the collapse of the Soviet Union. Previously, the forest was protected by the restrictions of the Soviet Forest Ministry, but with the collapse of the Union, the restrictions regarding trade with Western nations have vanished. Trees are easy to harvest and sell well, so loggers have begun harvesting Russian taiga evergreen trees for sale to nations previously forbidden by Soviet law.[49]

text: In Canada, eight percent of the taiga is protected from development, the provincial government allows forest management to occur on Crown land under rigorous constraints.

text: The main forestry practice in the boreal forest of Canada is clearcutting, which involves cutting down most of the trees in a given area, then replanting the forest as a monocrop (one species of tree) the following season.

text: Some of the products from logged boreal forests include toilet paper, copy paper, newsprint, and lumber. More than 90% of boreal forest products from Canada are exported for consumption and processing in the United States.

text: Some of the larger cities situated in this biome are Murmansk,[50] Arkhangelsk, Yakutsk, Anchorage,[51] Yellowknife, Tromsø, Luleå, and Oulu.

text: Most companies that harvest in Canadian forests are certified by an independent third party agency such as the Forest Stewardship Council (FSC), Sustainable Forests Initiative (SFI), or the Canadian Standards Association (CSA). While the certification process differs between these groups, all of them include forest stewardship, respect for aboriginal peoples, compliance with local, provincial or national environmental laws, forest worker safety, education and training, and other environmental, business, and social requirements. The prompt renewal of all harvest sites by planting or natural renewal is also required.

text: Climate change

text: During the last quarter of the twentieth century, the zone of latitude occupied by the boreal forest experienced some of the greatest temperature increases on Earth. Winter temperatures have increased more than summer temperatures. The number of days with extremely cold temperatures (e.g., −20 to −40 °C (-4 to -40 °F) has decreased irregularly but systematically in nearly all the boreal region, allowing better survival for tree-damaging insects. In summer, the daily low temperature has increased more than the daily high temperature.[52] In Fairbanks, Alaska, the length of the frost-free season has increased from 60–90 days in the early twentieth century to about 120 days a century later. Summer warming has been shown to increase water stress and reduce tree growth in dry areas of the southern boreal forest in central Alaska, western Canada and portions of far eastern Russia. Precipitation is relatively abundant in Scandinavia, Finland, northwest Russia and eastern Canada, where a longer growth season (i.e. the period when sap flow is not impeded by frozen water) accelerate tree growth. As a consequence of this warming trend, the warmer parts of the boreal forests are susceptible to replacement by grassland, parkland or temperate forest.[53]

text: In Siberia, the taiga is converting from predominantly needle-shedding larch trees to evergreen conifers in response to a warming climate. This is likely to further accelerate warming, as the evergreen trees will absorb more of the sun's rays. Given the vast size of the area, such a change has the potential to affect areas well outside of the region.[54] In much of the boreal forest in Alaska, the growth of white spruce trees are stunted by unusually warm summers, while trees on some of the coldest fringes of the forest are experiencing faster growth than previously.[55]

text: Lack of moisture in the warmer summers are also stressing the birch trees of central Alaska.[56]

text: Insects

text: Recent years have seen outbreaks of insect pests in forest-destroying plagues: the spruce-bark beetle (Dendroctonus rufipennis) in Yukon and Alaska;[57] the mountain pine beetle in British Columbia; the aspen-leaf miner; the larch sawfly; the spruce budworm (Choristoneura fumiferana);[58] the spruce coneworm.[59]

text: Pollution

text: The effect of sulphur dioxide on woody boreal forest species was investigated by Addison et al. (1984),[60] who exposed plants growing on native soils and tailings to 15.2 μmol/m3 (0.34 ppm) of SO2 on CO2 assimilation rate (NAR). The Canadian maximum acceptable limit for atmospheric SO2 is 0.34 ppm. Fumigation with SO2 significantly reduced NAR in all species and produced visible symptoms of injury in 2–20 days. The decrease in NAR of deciduous species (trembling aspen [Populus tremuloides], willow [Salix], green alder [Alnus viridis], and white birch [Betula papyrifera]) was significantly more rapid than of conifers (white spruce, black spruce [Picea mariana], and jack pine [Pinus banksiana]) or an evergreen angiosperm (Labrador tea) growing on a fertilized Brunisol. These metabolic and visible injury responses seemed to be related to the differences in S uptake owing in part to higher gas exchange rates for deciduous species than for conifers. Conifers growing in oil sands tailings responded to SO2 with a significantly more rapid decrease in NAR compared with those growing in the Brunisol, perhaps because of predisposing toxic material in the tailings. However, sulphur uptake and visible symptom development did not differ between conifers growing on the 2 substrates.

text: Acidification of precipitation by anthropogenic, acid-forming emissions has been associated with damage to vegetation and reduced forest productivity, but 2-year-old white spruce that were subjected to simulated acid rain (at pH 4.6, 3.6, and 2.6) applied weekly for 7 weeks incurred no statistically significant (P 0.05) reduction in growth during the experiment compared with the background control (pH 5.6) (Abouguendia and Baschak 1987).[61] However, symptoms of injury were observed in all treatments, the number of plants and the number of needles affected increased with increasing rain acidity and with time. Scherbatskoy and Klein (1983)[62] found no significant effect of chlorophyll concentration in white spruce at pH 4.3 and 2.8, but Abouguendia and Baschak (1987)[61] found a significant reduction in white spruce at pH 2.6, while the foliar sulphur content significantly greater at pH 2.6 than any of the other treatments.

text: Protection

text: Many nations are taking direct steps to protect the ecology of the taiga by prohibiting logging, mining, oil and gas production, and other forms of development. In February 2010 the Canadian government established protection for 13,000 square kilometres of boreal forest by creating a new 10,700-square-kilometre park reserve in the Mealy Mountains area of eastern Canada and a 3,000-square-kilometre waterway provincial park that follows alongside the Eagle River from headwaters to sea.[63]

text: Two Canadian provincial governments, Ontario and Quebec, introduced measures in 2008 that would protect at least half of their northern boreal forest.[64][65] Although both provinces admitted it will take years to plan, work with Aboriginal and local communities and ultimately map out precise boundaries of the areas off-limits to development, the measures are expected to create some of the largest protected areas networks in the world once completed. Both announcements came the following year after a letter signed by 1,500 scientists called on political leaders to protect at least half of the boreal forest.[66]

text: The taiga stores enormous quantities of carbon, more than the world's temperate and tropical forests combined, much of it in wetlands and peatland.[67] In fact, current estimates place boreal forests as storing twice as much carbon per unit area as tropical forests.[68]

text: Natural disturbance

text: One of the biggest areas of research and a topic still full of unsolved questions is the recurring disturbance of fire and the role it plays in propagating the lichen woodland.[69] The phenomenon of wildfire by lightning strike is the primary determinant of understory vegetation and because of this, it is considered to be the predominant force behind community and ecosystem properties in the lichen woodland.[70] The significance of fire is clearly evident when one considers that understory vegetation influences tree seedling germination in the short term and decomposition of biomass and nutrient availability in the long term.[70] The recurrent cycle of large, damaging fire occurs approximately every 70 to 100 years.[71] Understanding the dynamics of this ecosystem is entangled with discovering the successional paths that the vegetation exhibits after a fire. Trees, shrubs, and lichens all recover from fire-induced damage through vegetative reproduction as well as invasion by propagules.[72] Seeds that have fallen and become buried provide little help in re-establishment of a species. The reappearance of lichens is reasoned to occur because of varying conditions and light/nutrient availability in each different microstate.[72] Several different studies have been done that have led to the formation of the theory that post-fire development can be propagated by any of four pathways: self replacement, species-dominance relay, species replacement, or gap-phase self replacement.[69] Self replacement is simply the re-establishment of the pre-fire dominant species. Species-dominance relay is a sequential attempt of tree species to establish dominance in the canopy. Species replacement is when fires occur in sufficient frequency to interrupt species dominance relay. Gap-Phase Self-Replacement is the least common and so far has only been documented in Western Canada. It is a self replacement of the surviving species into the canopy gaps after a fire kills another species. The particular pathway taken after a fire disturbance depends on how the landscape is able to support trees as well as fire frequency.[73] Fire frequency has a large role in shaping the original inception of the lower forest line of the lichen woodland taiga.

text: It has been hypothesized by Serge Payette that the spruce-moss forest ecosystem was changed into the lichen woodland biome due to the initiation of two compounded strong disturbances: large fire and the appearance and attack of the spruce budworm.[74] The spruce budworm is a deadly insect to the spruce populations in the southern regions of the taiga. J.P. Jasinski confirmed this theory five years later stating “Their [lichen woodlands] persistence, along with their previous moss forest histories and current occurrence adjacent to closed moss forests, indicate that they are an alternative stable state to the spruce–moss forests”.[75]

text: Taiga ecoregions

text:
Palearctic boreal forests/taiga

v
t
e

East Siberian taiga
Russia

Iceland boreal birch forests and alpine tundra
Iceland

Kamchatka-Kurile meadows and sparse forests
Russia

Kamchatka-Kurile taiga
Russia

Northeast Siberian taiga
Russia

Okhotsk-Manchurian taiga
Russia

Sakhalin Island taiga
Russia

Scandinavian and Russian taiga
Finland, Norway, Russia, Sweden

Trans-Baikal conifer forests
Mongolia, Russia

Urals montane tundra and taiga
Russia

West Siberian taiga
Russia

Romincka Forest
Poland, Russia

text:
Nearctic Boreal forests/taiga

v
t
e

Alaska Peninsula montane taiga
United States

Central Canadian Shield forests
Canada

Cook Inlet taiga
United States

Copper Plateau taiga
United States

Eastern Canadian forests
Canada

Eastern Canadian Shield taiga
Canada

Interior Alaska-Yukon lowland taiga
Canada, United States

Mid-Continental Canadian forests
Canada

Midwestern Canadian Shield forests
Canada

Muskwa-Slave Lake forests
Canada

Newfoundland Highland forests
Canada

Northern Canadian Shield taiga
Canada

Northern Cordillera forests
Canada

Northwest Territories taiga
Canada

South Avalon-Burin oceanic barrens
Canada

Northern Lake Superior Taiga
United States, Canada

Southern Hudson Bay taiga
Canada

Yukon Interior dry forests
Canada


document_title: Road speed limits in the United Kingdom

question_text: what is the speed limit on the m5

question_tokens: what is the speed limit on the m5

root

text: Road speed limits in the United Kingdom

text: Current regulations[edit]

text: National speed limits[edit]

text: Default maximum speed limits apply to all roads where no specific lower numeric speed limit is already in force. The default speed limit is known as the national speed limit (NSL). The NSLs vary by road type and for vehicle types.[2][3]

tag: p

text:
National speed limits by vehicle type and road type

Restricted road
Single-track road
Single carriageway
Dual carriageway
Motorway

Cars and motorcycles (including car-derived vans up to 2 tonnes max laden weight)
30 mph (48 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)
70 mph (113 km/h)
70 mph (113 km/h)

Vehicles towing caravans or trailers
inc cars, motorcycles, goods vehicles up to 7.5 tonnes MLW
30 mph (48 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

Buses, coaches, minibuses up to 12 metres (39 ft)
Goods vehicles up to 7.5 tonnes MLW
30 mph (48 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)
70 mph (113 km/h)

Goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes MLW (in England and Wales)
30 mph (48 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

Goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes MLW (in Scotland, except A9 Perth to Inverness)
30 mph (48 km/h)
40 mph (64 km/h)
40 mph (64 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

Goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes MLW (on A9 Perth to Inverness)
30 mph (48 km/h)
n/a
50 mph (80 km/h)
50 mph (80 km/h)
n/a

tag: table

text: Speed limiters[edit]

text: Some classes of vehicles are required to have speed limiters which enforce a maximum speed by physical means. Older vehicles still in use do not have limiters fitted or have them set at a higher speeds.[4] New vehicles should be fitted with limiters as follows:

text:
Buses and coaches, including Minibuses: 100 km/h (62 mph)[n 1]
HGVs: 90 km/h (56 mph) or 85 km/h (53 mph) depending on class.[n 1]
Mopeds: 45 km/h (28 mph)[n 2]

tag: ul

text: Some other vehicles, especially light commercial or service vehicles, may be voluntarily fitted with limiters by their owners (either private businesspeople or company fleets), generally set at 90, 97, 100, 110 or 113 km/h (56, 60, 62, 68 or 70 mph), though some ultralight citybound service vehicles may be limited to 80 km/h (50 mph) or less. In all cases, a warning sticker must be displayed on the rear of the vehicle and, technically speaking at least, they are not allowed to use the outermost lane of a motorway with 3 or more running lanes.[citation needed]

text: Types of speed limit[edit]

text: Fixed speed limits[edit]

text: Speed limit road signs are used to inform road users where speed limits other than the applicable national speed limit apply. For some types of vehicles, on some types of road, speed limits lower than the signed limit apply.

text:
Numeric speed limit exceptions by vehicle type and road type

Signed
Vehicle type
Speed limit if other than signed

Single carriageway
Dual carriageway
Motorway

20-50
(special cases only)

60
Any Vehicle under 7.5 tonnes towing caravans or trailers; buses, coaches and minibuses up to 12 metres (39 ft) and Goods vehicles up to 7.5 tonnes MLW
50 mph (80 km/h)

Goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes MLW
50 mph (80 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

70
Buses, coaches and minibuses up to 12 metres (39 ft) and Goods vehicles up to 7.5 tonnes MLW (modern vehicles also have speed limiters which limit speed further - see below)
n/a*
60 mph (97 km/h)

Cars, motorcycles and Goods vehicles up to 7.5 tonnes MLW and towing caravans or trailers
n/a*
60 mph (97 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

Goods vehicles over 7.5 tonnes MLW
n/a*
60 mph (97 km/h)
60 mph (97 km/h)

text: * a small, decreasing number of single-carriageway motorways do exist, both technical/"secret" and overtly signed, but they are almost universally either subject to a signed limit below 70 mph, or too short for any but the most powerful vehicles to exceed 60 mph for any significant distance.

text: Variable speed limits[edit]

text: Variable speed limits are used on some major traffic roads. These can be changed in response to weather, traffic levels, time of day or for other reasons with the currently applicable speed limit is displayed using an electronic road sign. Signs with the speed shown in a red circle are compulsory, signs where the speed is not within a red circle are advisory and exceeding these speeds while driving safely within the applicable national speed limit is not in itself an offence.[5] Variable speed limits were introduced on some congested major routes as an element of controlled motorway techniques to improve traffic flows for given prevailing conditions.[6] Part-time variable speed limits may also be used outside schools.[citation needed]

text: Minimum speed limits[edit]

text: Rarely, minimum speed limits are used, such as through the Mersey Tunnels, to maintain free flow and safe passage through otherwise hazardous or enclosed areas.[7] Circular blue signs with white numbers indicate the start of these limits, and similar signs with a red diagonal line indicate their end.[8] Contrary to popular belief, there is no minimum speed limit on motorways, although certain classes of slow vehicles (as well as those of any class that cannot maintain 25 mph on the level whilst unladen) are prohibited on safety grounds and drivers are expected to not cause unnecessary obstruction by driving unusually slowly.

text: Justification[edit]

text: According to the government, speed limits are used to help achieve appropriate traffic speeds for safety, and environmental and accessibility reasons.[9] The Department for Transport state that "speed limits play a fundamental role" in the effective management of traffic speeds in relation to the safety of both drivers and all other road users.[10]

text: Safety[edit]

text: The 30 mph (48km/h) speed limit in built-up areas was introduced in 1930 in response to high casualty levels.[11] The 70 mph (112km/h) limit on previously unrestricted roads was introduced in 1965 following a number of serious motorway accidents in fog earlier the same year.[12]

text: The Department for Transport believes that effective speed management involves many components but that speed limits play a 'fundamental role' and are 'a key source of information to road users' particularly as an indicator of the nature and risks posed by that road to both themselves and other motorised and non-motorised road users.[10]

text: The Parliamentary Select Committee for Transport Safety published a report entitled 'The Ending the Scandal of Complacency' in 2007 which highlighted how casualty levels rise with increasing speed and recommended reducing speed limits on streets with high pedestrian populations and on dangerous rural roads. The report highlights that when two cars crash at 60 mph a driver there is a 90% chance of death which falls to 65% at 50 mph. While recommending 20 mph speed zones the committee noted that these zones 'should not rely on heavy-handed enforcement measures'.[13]

text: The World Health Organisation published a report in 2004 highlighting that a total of 22% of all 'injury mortality' worldwide were from road traffic injuries in 2002[n 3] and that the speed of vehicles was 'at the core of the problem[n 4] Road incidents are said to be the leading cause of deaths among children 10 – 19 years of age (260,000 children die a year, 10 million are injured).[14]

text: In 2008 14% of collisions reported to the police had a speed related contributory factor (either "exceeding the speed limit" or "travelling too fast for conditions") reported rising to 24% for fatal accidents and 25% of all road deaths.[n 5] "Exceeding the speed limit" was reported as a contributory factor in 5% of collisions and 14% of fatal collisions. "Travelling too fast for conditions" (but within the prevailing speed limit) was recorded as one of the contributory factors in a further 8% of all collisions (and 9% of all fatal, 9% of all serious and 8% of all slight accidents),[n 6]

text: The UK government publishes Reported Road Casualties Great Britain (RRCGB) each year, based on road traffic casualties data (STATS19) reported to the police, which has been collected since 1949, and with additional data going back to 1926.[15] The highest number of road fatalities recorded in a single year in GB was 9,196 in 1941.[n 7] The highest number of fatalities during peacetime was 7,985 for 1966,[n 8] following the introduction of the national 70 mph speed limit in 1965 and the year before the legal drink drive limit and the associated Breathalyzer laws were introduced.

text: The 2009 edition also summarised the characteristics of speed related fatal collisions as typically occurring on unclassified rural 60 mph speed limit roads, the driver being a male under the age of 30, with the collision types being head-on, lost control or cornering and the cause being loss of control whilst cornering or overtaking and the contributory factors being excess or inappropriate speed, loss of control, aggressive, careless or reckless behaviour or in a hurry.[n 9]

text: Environmental and accessibility[edit]

text: Speed limits are also used where reduced vehicle speeds are desired to help reduce vehicle emissions and traffic noise, and to improve the accessibility conditions for more vulnerable road users such as pedestrians and cyclists and to reduce the perceived traffic risk for local people.[16]

text: During the 1973 oil crisis a temporary maximum national speed limit of 50 mph (80 km/h) was introduced on all roads, including motorways to reduce fuel consumption, which was later progressively raised on Motorways (to 70 mph) and dual carriageways (to 60 mph), before a final change to single and dual carriageway non-motorway roads that produced the current NSL situation.[17]

text: Effectiveness[edit]

text: Parliament estimates that "Most drivers and pedestrians think speeds are generally too high but 95% of all drivers admit to exceeding speed limits".[18] DfT guidance makes it clear that setting speed limits in isolation, or setting ones that are "unrealistically low" may be ineffective and lead to disrespect for the speed limit.[19] Bath and North East Somerset Council say that speed limits on their own do not necessarily reduce traffic speeds and should be supported by enforcement to target "irresponsible drivers" or traffic calming.[16]

text: 20 mph speed limits and zones[edit]

text: The Department for Transport encourages the use of either '20 mph speed limits' or '20 mph speed limit zones' in urban situations where vulnerable road users are at particular risk.[20]

text: In 1998 the TRL reported[21] that signed 20 mph (32 km/h) speed limits only reduced traffic speeds by about 1 mph and delivered no discernible reduction in accident numbers but that 20 mph zones achieved average speed reductions of 10 mph with child pedestrian accident reductions of 70% and child cyclist accident reductions of 48%.[22] The report noted that the cost of wide area traffic calming was prohibitive.

text: 20 mph speed limits[edit]

text: 20 mph speed limits are based on signage alone and are used where 85th percentile speeds are already below 24 mph.[20]

text: A report published in 2010 by the Department for Transport regarding Portsmouth City Council's 20 mph (32 km/h) speed limit on 410 km (250 mi) of the city's 438 km (272 mi) of roads found a small (1.3 mph) reduction in traffic speed and a small 8% increase in the number of serious accidents – neither of which were statistically significant – and a 21% reduction in the number of accidents. There was a 6% increase in the numbers killed or seriously injured (KSI) – also not statistically significant due to the small numbers involved – and a 22% reduction in the total number of road casualties.[23]

text: 20 mph zones[edit]

text: In places where 20 mph speeds are desired but where excessive speeds (85th percentile speed of 24 mph or above) occur, 20 mph zones are recommended. These have to use traffic calming measures to reduce speeds to below 20 mph.[24]

text: In 1992 David Harding-Price a parish councillor in Barrow-Upon-Humber proposed a 20 mph speed limit outside the local school. This was rejected by the council. By August 2002, Kingston upon Hull had introduced 112 20-mph zones and 190 km of roads subject to a 20 mph limit covering 26% of the city's streets which they described as contributing to "dramatic reductions in road casualties". Total collisions were reduced by 56%, Killed & seriously injured collisions down 90%, child casualties collisions down 64% and all pedestrian collisions down 54% and child pedestrian collisions down 74%.[25]

text: A report published in 2008 estimated that following the introduction of 20 mph zones in London, a reduction of casualties by 45% and KSI by 57% occurred.[26]

text: Shared space[edit]

text: Research carried out for the Department for Transport, to provide supporting evidence for Local Transport Note 1/11 on shared space, showed that in all of the ten shared space sites that were studied, that although they all had speed limits of 30 mph, that the average speeds on them was around 20 mph.[27]

text: The introduction of the 70 mph speed limit[edit]

text: In 1966, at the end of the 4-month trial of a blanket 70 mph (113 km/h) speed limit on previously unrestricted roads and motorways, speed checks on the M6 in Cheshire suggested that although cars were actually being driven about 10 mph (16 km/h) faster, they were still usually travelling at speeds below the new limit. The crash rate was lower on the M6 in Staffordshire (the better weather was noted too) and continued to fall on the M5 in Worcestershire as it had before the new limit was imposed, and there was no change in the crash rate on the M6 in Cheshire or on the M1 in Northamptonshire.[28]

text: Enforcement[edit]

text: Speed limit enforcement is used to check that road vehicles are complying with the speed limits. Methods used include Fixed speed cameras, Average speed cameras and also police operated LIDAR speed guns and older radar speed guns. In addition Vehicle activated sign and Community Speed Watch groups also encourage compliance. For lower speed limits, physical Traffic Calming is normally required. Fixed speed cameras are controversial with various advocacy groups supporting and opposing their use.[29][30]

text: The Nottingham Safety Camera Pilot achieved "virtually complete compliance" on the major ring road into the city using average speed cameras,[31] and across all Nottinghamshire SPECS installations their KSI figures have fallen by an average of 65%.[32]

text: Advocacy[edit]

text: Since they have been introduced various groups have campaigned on the subject who either consider them to be irrelevant, set too low or set too high.

text: Advocacy groups include Association of British Drivers, The Automobile Association, Living Streets (The Pedestrians' Association), RAC Foundation, RoadPeace, Royal Automobile Club (originally the Automobile Club), Twenty is Plenty (20's Plenty for Us), Safe Speed and others.

text: History[edit]

text: Early years[edit]

text: The first speed limits in the United Kingdom were set by a series of restrictive Locomotive Acts (in 1861, 1865 and 1878). The 1861 Act introduced a 10 mph (16 km/h) limit (powered passenger vehicles were then termed “light locomotives”). The 1865 'Red Flag Act' reduced the speed limit to 4 mph (6 km/h) in the country and 2 mph (3 km/h) in towns and required a man with a red flag or lantern to walk 60 yards (50 m) ahead of each vehicle, and warn horse riders and horse drawn traffic of the approach of a self-propelled machine. The 1878 Act removed the need for the flag[33] and reduced the distance of the escort to 20 yards (20 m).[34]

text: Following intense advocacy by motor vehicle enthusiasts, including Harry J. Lawson of the Daimler Company the most restrictive parts of the acts were lifted by the Locomotives on Highways Act 1896.[35] which raised the speed limit to 14 mph (23 km/h) and removed the need for the escort.[36] A celebratory run from London to Brighton was held soon after the act was passed and has been commemorated each year since 1927 by the London to Brighton Veteran Car Run.[36]

text: The speed limit for motor cars was raised to 20 mph (32 km/h) by the Motor Car Act 1903 which stood until 1 January 1931 when all speed limits for cars and motorcycles were abolished under the Road Traffic Act 1930.[37] Lord Buckmaster's opinion at the time was that the speed limit was removed because "the existing speed limit was so universally disobeyed that its maintenance brought the law into contempt".[38] Between 1930 and 1935 the number of annual road fatalities dropped from 7,305 to 6,502.[n 8] The same act also introduced a 30 mph (48 km/h) speed limits for UK coach services, UK bus services and most HGVs.[39] Buses were not necessarily fitted with Speedometers at this stage.[40]

text: A 'Road traffic (speedometer) bill' was debated in 1933 relating only to vehicles to which current speed limits applied.[41]

text: The Road Traffic Act 1934, created by Leslie Hore-Belisha, the then Minister of Transport, introduced a speed limit of 30 mph (48 km/h) in built-up areas for cars and motorcycles which came into effect on 18 March 1935.[42] The definition of a built-up area was based on the presence of street lighting,[43] which had previously been mandated by the Public Health Act 1875.[44] The re-introduction of a speed limit for cars was in response to concern at increased road casualties.[11] The number of fatalities had increased to 7,343 deaths, half of the deaths were pedestrians and of three-quarters of these occurred in built-up areas.[45] Between 1935 and 1940 the number of annual road fatalities increased from 6,502 to 8,609.[n 8]

text: Speedometers were made compulsory for new cars in 1937.[46][47]

text: World War II[edit]

text: A 20 mph (32 km/h) night-time speed limit for built-up areas was introduced in 1940 as an attempt to halt the increase in the number of road casualties occurring during the World War II blackouts.[48] Following the introduction of blackouts fatalities rose on speed-limited roads from 289 in March 1939 to 325 in March 1940.[49] For October 1940 the total number of deaths during daylight (when the speed limit didn't apply) fell, in relation to those for October 1939, from 511 to 462, whereas the figures for the black-out hours (when the speed limit did apply) rose from 501 to 684.[50] The highest number of deaths in any one year in the UK occurred the following year (9,196 people in 1941).[n 10]

text: On 1 October 1956, the 30 mph (48 km/h) speed limit for built-up areas became permanent under the Road Traffic Act 1956. The speed limit, introduced on a trial basis in 1935, had relied on being renewed by Parliament each year.[51] The maximum speed limit for goods vehicles was raised from 20 mph (32 km/h) to 30 mph (48 km/h) in 1957.[52]

text: In addition, around 1958 some 30 mph roads had the limit raised to 40 mph to improve transit times, an early example being on Croydon Road in Mitcham, Surrey, saving, it was estimated, 33 seconds in journey time across Mitcham common.[53]

text: Following a series of serious motorway multiple crashes in the fog in 1965, Tom Fraser, the then Minister of Transport, following consultations in early November with the police and with the National Road Safety Advisory Council (NRSAC), concluded that the crashes were caused by vehicles travelling too fast for the prevailing conditions. The NRSAC advised that a 20 mph (32 km/h) motorway speed limit should be imposed on motorway stretches affected by fog and that a general speed limit of 70 mph (113 km/h) should be experimentally applied for the winter months.[54]

text: On 25 November 1965 the government announced that a temporary 30 mph (48 km/h) speed limit would be applied to sections of motorway (there were 350 miles (560 km) of it at that time) affected by fog, ice or snow and that a general maximum speed limit of 70 mph (113 km/h) would be applied to all otherwise unrestricted roads, including motorways, for a trial period of four months starting just before Christmas.[12] The four-month trial 70 mph (113 km/h) speed limit on 100,000 miles (160,000 km) of previously unrestricted roads and motorways was introduced at noon on 22 December 1965.[55] Also on that day, the power for the police to apply advisory speed limits of 30 mph (48 km/h) to motorways affected by bad weather was also introduced. The advisory limit was activated by the use of flashing amber lights placed at 1 mile (1.6 km) intervals along the motorways.[55]

text: In April 1966 Barbara Castle, the new Minister of Transport, decided to extend the experimental 70 mph (113 km/h) limit for a further two months to allow the Road Research Laboratory (RRL) time to collect data as there was still no conclusive evidence of its effectiveness.[56] In May 1966 Barbara Castle extended the experimental period by a further fifteen months to 3 September 1967 as "the case is not proven" but there were signs of crash rate reduction.[57]

text: In July 1966 the speed limit for "public service vehicles" (notably buses) was raised from 40 mph (64 km/h) to 50 mph (80 km/h).[58] During 1966, the highest number of fatalities during peacetime at 7,985 deaths, was recorded.[n 8]

text: In July 1967, Castle announced that 70 mph (113 km/h) was to become the permanent maximum speed limit for all roads and motorways. She had accepted RRL evidence that the speed limit had reduced the number of casualties on motorways. She ruled out minimum speed limits for motorways which would also reduce the danger of slow traffic as being too difficult to enforce and likely to increase congestion off the motorways.

text: The two major motoring organisations at the time, The Automobile Association and the R.A.C. welcomed the maximum speed limits for all-purpose roads, but the R.A.C. would have preferred more flexibility for motorways. The Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents suggested that a lower speed limit would be more appropriate for all-purpose roads and the Pedestrian's Association for Road Safety condemned the new limits as being too high, preferring 60 mph (97 km/h) limits for all roads.[59] Castle's decision and acceptance of the RRL research at face value was controversial. Peter Walker's motion in Parliament to annul the speed limit on motorways was negatived.[60]

text: 1973 oil crisis[edit]

text: Due to the 1973 oil crisis, a temporary maximum national speed limit of 50 mph (80 km/h) for all roads, including motorways, was introduced on 8 December 1973.[17] The 70 mph (113 km/h) limit was restored on motorways in March 1974 and on all other roads on 8 May 1974.[61]

text: As an initiative to reduce energy consumption, the national speed limits for otherwise unrestricted single-carriageway and dual-carriageway roads were temporarily reduced to 50 mph (80 km/h) and 60 mph (97 km/h) respectively (motorway speed limits were left unchanged at 70 mph (113 km/h)) from 14 December 1974.[62] In November 1976 the temporary speed limits were extended at least until the end of May 1977.[63] In April 1977, the government announced that the national speed limits for single-carriageway roads was to be increased to 60 mph (97 km/h) and that the 70 mph (113 km/h) speed limit was to be restored on dual-carriageways on 1 June 1977.[64][65]

text: A speed limiter requirement for mopeds was introduced in 1977, with the speed cap being progressively redefined from 35 mph (56 km/h), to 30 mph (48 km/h), back up to 50 km/h (31 mph) and finally to 45 km/h (28 mph) in the late 2000s.[n 2]

text: The 70 mph (113 km/h) speed limit was made permanent in 1978.[n 11]

text: The Road Traffic Regulation Act, which was passed in 1984, includes legislation relating to speed limits. Part VI of the Act[66] defines the default speed limit for 'regularly'-lit roads,[67] gives local authorities powers to create 'speed limit orders', and exempts emergency vehicles from speed limits; the Act also defines speeding offences.[68]

text: The first 20 mph (32 km/h) speed limits for residential areas were introduced in 1991[n 12] and then speed limiters for buses and coaches set at 65 mph (105 km/h) and also for HGVs set at 56 mph (90 km/h) in 1994.[n 1] It was made easier for local authorities to introduce a 20 mph (32 km/h) limit in 1999.[69]

text: In March 2009 the Government consulted on reducing speed limits on rural roads (on which 52% of fatalities had occurred in the previous year) to 50 mph. It explained that 'crashes were more likely on rural parts of the road network, upon most of which the national speed limit of 60 mph applies'. The Conservative opposition party and the AA were both opposed. The president of the AA said that speed limits that are too low can result in a greater number of accidents and that a "blanket reduction of speed limits would not make roads safer, given that many accidents on rural roads involved only one car".[70]

text: In February 2010 the Department for Transport undertook a consultation to set a 65 mph speed limit for all buses, minibuses and coaches with more than eight passenger seats.[71][72] These proposals were not taken up.

text: In April 2015 the speed limit for Heavy Goods Vehicles over 7.5 tonnes was increased from 40 to 50 mph on single carriageways and from 50 mph to 60 mph on dual carriageways in England and Wales, but not Scotland. [73]

text: Notes[edit]

text:
^ Jump up to: a b c Department for Transport (2009), p.181 "Speed limiter settings lowered to 65 mph for new buses and coaches and to 56 mph for HGVs."
^ Jump up to: a b Department for Transport (2009), p.179 "Mopeds redefined to 30 mph maximum design speed"
Jump up ^ World Health Organisation (2004) p. 34 fig 2.1
Jump up ^ World Health Organisation (2004) p. 76
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p. 41 "Fourteen per cent of accidents had a speed related contributory factor reported, either exceeding the speed limit or travelling too fast for conditions. This increased to 24% for fatal accidents, accounting for 25% of all road deaths."
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p. 45 "Exceeding the speed limit was reported as a contributory factor in 5% of all accidents. However, the factor became more signiﬁcant with the severity of the accident. It was reported in 14% of fatal accidents and these accidents accounted for 362 fatalities, 15% of all deaths... The factor travelling too fast for conditions was a contributory factor in 8% of accidents. Again, the proportion of accidents where it was reported rose with the severity of the accident and 9% of fatal resulting in 224 fatalities, 10% of all deaths (Excluding accidents and casualties in accidents which had exceeding the speed limit reported as a contributory factor)"
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p.106 "The highest record road death figure was 9,196 in 1941"
^ Jump up to: a b c d Department for Transport (2009), p. 106 table 2
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2010), pdf p. 91, table 7a
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p. 106 "The highest record road death figure was 9,196 in 1941"
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p.179 "60 and 70 mph speed limits are made permanent"
Jump up ^ Department for Transport (2009), p.180 "First 20mph zones introduced"

tag: ol


document_title: Guaporé River

question_text: south american river also known as rio itenez in bolivia

text: Guaporé River

text:
Guaporé River

Iténez River

Rio Guaporé at Pontes e Lacerda (Brazil)

Countries
Bolivia, Brazil

Tributaries

 - left
Alegre River, Verde River, Paragúa River, Río Blanco, Machupo River

 - right
Guatire River, Branco River, Corumbiara River, Colorado River, Massaco River, Cabixi River

Source
Parecis plateau

 - location
Mato Grosso, Brazil

 - elevation
631 m (2,070 ft)

 - coordinates
14°35′58″S 58°57′11″W / 14.59944°S 58.95306°W / -14.59944; -58.95306

Mouth
Mamoré River

 - location
Brazil/Bolivia

 - elevation
131 m (430 ft)

 - coordinates
11°53′15″S 65°1′53″W / 11.88750°S 65.03139°W / -11.88750; -65.03139Coordinates: 11°53′15″S 65°1′53″W / 11.88750°S 65.03139°W / -11.88750; -65.03139

Length
1,210 km (750 mi) [1]

Basin
266,460 km2 (102,880 sq mi)

Discharge
mouth

 - average
1,530 m3/s (54,030 cu ft/s)

Map of the Amazon Basin with the Guaporé River highlighted

text: Guaporé River (Portuguese: Rio Guaporé) is a river in western Brazil and northeastern Bolivia. Its Bolivian name is Río Iténez. It is 1,530 km (950 mi) long; 970 km (600 mi) of the river forms the border between Brazil and Bolivia.

text: The Guaporé River is part of the Madeira River basin, which eventually empties into the Amazon River. The Guaporé River crosses the eastern part of the Beni savanna region.[2] It forms the border of the 615,771 hectares (1,521,600 acres) Guaporé Biological Reserve, and is fed by rivers originating in the reserve, the São Miguel, Branco, São Simão, Massaco and Colorado.[3]

text: About 260 fish species are known from the Guaporé River basin, and about 25 of these are endemic.[4] While many fish species in the river essentially are Amazonian, the fauna in the Guaporé also has a connection with the Paraguay River (part of the Río de la Plata Basin). The Guaporé and the Paraguay, while flowing in different directions, both originate in the Parecis plateau of Brazil.[5] Among the fish species shared between these rivers are the black phantom tetra (important in the aquarium industry) and golden dorado (important in fisheries).[6][7]


document_title: The Fountainhead

question_text: where does dominique francon first see howard roark

text: The Fountainhead

text: Plot[edit]

text: In the spring of 1922, Howard Roark is expelled from the architecture department of the Stanton Institute of Technology because he will not adhere to the school's preference for historical convention in building design. Roark goes to New York City and gets a job with Henry Cameron. Cameron was once a renowned architect, but now gets few commissions. In the meantime, Roark's popular, but vacuous, school roommate Peter Keating (whom Roark sometimes helped with projects) graduates with high honors. He too moves to New York, where he has been offered a position with the prestigious architecture firm, Francon & Heyer. Keating ingratiates himself with senior partner Guy Francon and works to remove rivals within his firm. Eventually, he is made a partner. Meanwhile, Roark and Cameron create inspired work, but struggle financially.

text: After Cameron retires, Keating hires Roark, whom Francon soon fires for refusing to design a building in the classical style. Roark works briefly at another firm, then opens his own office but has trouble finding clients and closes it down. He gets a job in a granite quarry owned by Francon. There he meets Francon's daughter Dominique, a columnist for The New York Banner, while she is staying at her family's estate nearby. They are immediately attracted to each other, leading to a rough sexual encounter that Dominique later calls a rape.[1] Shortly after, Roark is notified that a client is ready to start a new building, and he returns to New York. Dominique also returns to New York and learns Roark is an architect. She attacks his work in public, but visits him for secret sexual encounters.

text: Ellsworth M. Toohey, who writes a popular architecture column in the Banner, is an outspoken socialist who shapes public opinion through his column and a circle of influential associates. Toohey sets out to destroy Roark through a smear campaign. He recommends Roark to Hopton Stoddard, a wealthy acquaintance who wants to build a Temple of the Human Spirit. Roark's unusual design includes a nude statue modeled on Dominique; Toohey convinces Stoddard to sue Roark for malpractice. Toohey and several architects (including Keating) testify at the trial that Roark is incompetent as an architect due to his rejection of historical styles. Dominique speaks in Roark's defense, but he loses the case. Dominique decides that since she cannot have the world she wants, in which men like Roark are recognized for their greatness, she will live entirely in the world she has, which shuns Roark and praises Keating. She marries Keating and turns herself over to him, doing and saying whatever he wants, such as persuading potential clients to hire him instead of Roark.

text: To win Keating a prestigious commission offered by Gail Wynand, the owner and editor-in-chief of the Banner, Dominique agrees to sleep with Wynand. Wynand is so strongly attracted to Dominique that he pays Keating to divorce her, after which Wynand and Dominique are married. Wanting to build a home for himself and his new wife, Wynand discovers that Roark designed every building he likes and so hires him. Roark and Wynand become close friends; Wynand is unaware of Roark's past relationship with Dominique.

text: Washed up and out of the public eye, Keating pleads with Toohey to use his influence to get the commission for the much-sought-after Cortlandt housing project. Keating knows his most successful projects were aided by Roark, so he asks for Roark's help in designing Cortlandt. Roark agrees in exchange for complete anonymity and Keating's promise that it will be built exactly as designed. After taking a long vacation with Wynand, Roark returns to find that Keating was not able to prevent major changes from being made in Cortlandt's construction. Roark dynamites the project to prevent the subversion of his vision.

text: Roark is arrested and his action is widely condemned, but Wynand decides to use his papers to defend his friend. This unpopular stance hurts the circulation of his newspapers, and Wynand's employees go on strike after Wynand dismisses Toohey for disobeying him and criticizing Roark. Faced with the prospect of closing the paper, Wynand gives in and publishes a denunciation of Roark. At his trial, Roark makes a speech about the value of ego and integrity, and he is found not guilty. Dominique leaves Wynand for Roark. Wynand, who has betrayed his own values by attacking Roark, finally grasps the nature of the power he thought he held. He shuts down the Banner and commissions a final building from Roark, a skyscraper that will serve as a monument to human achievement. Eighteen months later, the Wynand Building is under construction. Dominique, now Roark's wife, enters the site to meet him atop its steel framework.

text: Major characters[edit]

text: Howard Roark[edit]

text: Rand's stated goal in writing fiction was to portray her vision of an ideal man.[2][3] The character of Howard Roark, the protagonist of The Fountainhead, was the first instance where she believed she had achieved this.[4] Roark embodies Rand's egoistic moral ideals,[5] especially the virtues of independence[6] and integrity.[7]

text: The character of Roark was at least partly inspired by American architect Frank Lloyd Wright. Rand described the inspiration as limited to specific ideas he had about architecture and "the pattern of his career".[8] She denied that Wright had anything to do with the philosophy expressed by Roark or the events of the plot.[9][10] Rand's denials have not stopped commentators from claiming stronger connections between Wright and Roark.[10][11] Wright equivocated about whether he thought Roark was based on him, sometimes implying that he did, at other times denying it.[12] Wright biographer Ada Louise Huxtable described significant differences between Wright's philosophy and Rand's, and quoted him declaring, "I deny the paternity and refuse to marry the mother."[13] Architecture critic Martin Filler said that Roark resembles the Swiss-French modernist architect Le Corbusier more closely than Wright.[14]

text: Peter Keating[edit]

text: In contrast to the individualistic Roark, Peter Keating is a conformist who bases his choices on what others want. Introduced to the reader as Roark's classmate in architecture school, Keating does not really want to be an architect. He loves painting, but his mother steers him toward architecture instead.[15] In this as in all his decisions, Keating does what others expect rather than follow his personal interests. He becomes a social climber, focused on improving his career and social standing using a combination of personal manipulation and conformity to popular styles.[15][16][17] He follows a similar path in his private life: He chooses a loveless marriage to Dominique instead of marrying the woman he loves—who lacks Dominique's beauty and social connections. By middle age, Keating's career is in decline and he is unhappy with his path, but it is too late for him to change.[18][19]

text: Rand did not use a specific architect as a model for Keating.[20] Her inspiration for the character came from a neighbor she knew while working in Hollywood in the early 1930s. Rand asked this young woman to explain her goals in life. The woman's response was focused on social comparisons: the neighbor wanted her material possessions and social standing to equal or exceed those of other people. Rand created Keating as an archetype of this motivation, which she saw as the opposite of self-interest.[21]

text: Dominique Francon[edit]

text: Dominique Francon is the heroine of The Fountainhead, described by Rand as "the woman for a man like Howard Roark".[22] Rand described Dominique as similar to herself "in a bad mood".[23] For most of the novel, the character operates from what Rand viewed as wrong ideas.[24] Believing that the values she admires cannot survive in the real world, she chooses to turn away from them so that the world cannot harm her. Only at the end of the novel does she accept that she can be happy and survive.[23][25][26]

text: The character has provoked varied reactions from commentators. Philosopher Chris Matthew Sciabarra called her "one of the more bizarre characters in the novel".[27] Literature scholar Mimi Reisel Gladstein called her "an interesting case study in perverseness".[17] Writer Tore Boeckmann described her as a character with conflicting beliefs and saw her actions as a logical representation of how those conflicts might play out.[28]

text: Gail Wynand[edit]

text: Gail Wynand is a wealthy newspaper mogul who rose from a destitute childhood in the ghettoes of New York to control much of the city's print media. While Wynand shares many of the character qualities of Roark, his success is dependent upon his ability to pander to public opinion. Rand presents this as a tragic flaw that eventually leads to his downfall. In her journals Rand described Wynand as "the man who could have been" a heroic individualist, contrasting him to Roark, "the man who can be and is".[29][30] Some elements of Wynand's character were inspired by real-life newspaper tycoon William Randolph Hearst,[29][31][32] including Hearst's yellow journalism and mixed success in attempts to gain political influence.[29] Wynand ultimately fails in his attempts to wield power, losing his newspaper, his wife, and his friendship with Roark.[33] The character has been interpreted as a representation of the master morality described by philosopher Friedrich Nietzsche;[34] his tragic nature illustrates Rand's rejection of Nietzsche's philosophy.[30][35][36] In Rand's view, a person like Wynand, who seeks power over others, is as much a "second-hander" as a conformist such as Keating.[37][38][39]

text: Ellsworth Toohey[edit]

text: Ellsworth Monkton Toohey is Roark's antagonist. He is Rand's personification of evil—the most active and self-aware villain in any of her novels.[18][40][41] Toohey is a socialist, and represents the spirit of collectivism more generally. He styles himself as representative of the will of the masses, but his actual desire is for power over others.[18][42] He controls individual victims by destroying their sense of self-worth, and seeks broader power (over "the world", as he declares to Keating in a moment of candor) by promoting the ideals of ethical altruism and a rigorous egalitarianism that treats all people and achievements as equally valuable.[40][43] Rand used her memory of the British democratic socialist Harold Laski to help her imagine what Toohey would do in a given situation. She attended a New York lecture by Laski as part of gathering material for the novel, following which she changed the physical appearance of the character to be similar to that of Laski.[44] New York intellectuals Lewis Mumford and Clifton Fadiman also helped inspire the character.[31][32]

text: History[edit]

text: Background and development[edit]

text: When Rand first arrived in New York as an immigrant from the Soviet Union in 1926, she was greatly impressed by the Manhattan skyline's towering skyscrapers, which she saw as symbols of freedom, and resolved that she would write about them.[45][46] In 1927, Rand was working as a junior screenwriter for movie producer Cecil B. DeMille when he asked her to write a script for what would become the 1928 film Skyscraper. The original story by Dudley Murphy was about two construction workers working on a skyscraper who are rivals for a woman's love. Rand rewrote it, transforming the rivals into architects. One of them, Howard Kane, was an idealist dedicated to erecting the skyscraper despite enormous obstacles. The film would have ended with Kane standing atop the completed skyscraper. DeMille rejected Rand's script, and the completed film followed Murphy's original idea. Rand's version contained elements she would use in The Fountainhead.[47][48]

text: In 1928, Rand made notes for a proposed, but never written, novel titled The Little Street.[49] Rand's notes for it contain elements that carried over into her work on The Fountainhead.[50] David Harriman, who edited the notes for the posthumously published Journals of Ayn Rand (1997), described the story's villain as a preliminary version of the character Ellsworth Toohey, and this villain's assassination by the protagonist as prefiguring the attempted assassination of Toohey.[51]

text: Rand began The Fountainhead (originally titled Second-Hand Lives) following the completion of her first novel, We the Living, in 1934. That earlier novel was based in part on people and events familiar to Rand; the new novel, on the other hand, focused on the less-familiar world of architecture. She therefore conducted extensive research that included reading many biographies and other books about architecture.[52] She also worked as an unpaid typist in the office of architect Ely Jacques Kahn.[53] Rand began her notes for the new novel in December 1935.[54]

text: Rand wanted to write a novel that was less overtly political than We the Living, to avoid being viewed as "a 'one-theme' author".[55] As she developed the story, she began to see more political meaning in the novel's ideas about individualism.[56] Rand also planned to introduce the novel's four sections with quotes from Friedrich Nietzsche, whose ideas had influenced her own intellectual development, but she eventually decided that Nietzsche's ideas were too different from hers. She edited the final manuscript to remove the quotes and other allusions to him.[57][58]

text: Rand's work on The Fountainhead was repeatedly interrupted. In 1937, she took a break from it to write a novella called Anthem. She also completed a stage adaptation of We the Living that ran briefly in 1940.[59] That same year, she became active in politics. She first worked as a volunteer in Wendell Willkie's presidential campaign, and then attempted to form a group for conservative intellectuals.[60] As her royalties from earlier projects ran out, she began doing freelance work as a script reader for movie studios. When Rand finally found a publisher, the novel was only one-third complete.[61]

text: Publication history[edit]

text: Although she was a previously published novelist and had a successful Broadway play, Rand had difficulty finding a publisher for The Fountainhead. Macmillan Publishing, which had published We the Living, rejected the book after Rand insisted they provide more publicity for her new novel than they had done for the first one.[62] Rand's agent began submitting the book to other publishers; in 1938, Knopf signed a contract to publish the book. When Rand was only a quarter done with the manuscript by October 1940, Knopf canceled her contract.[63] Several other publishers rejected the book. When Rand's agent began to criticize the novel, Rand fired the agent and decided to handle submissions herself.[64] Twelve publishers (including Macmillan and Knopf) rejected the book.[61][65][66]

text: While Rand was working as a script reader for Paramount Pictures, her boss put her in touch with the Bobbs-Merrill Company. A recently hired editor, Archibald Ogden, liked the book, but two internal reviewers gave conflicting opinions. One said it was a great book that would never sell; the other said it was trash but would sell well. Ogden's boss, Bobbs-Merrill president D.L. Chambers, decided to reject the book. Ogden responded by wiring to the head office, "If this is not the book for you, then I am not the editor for you." His strong stand won Rand the contract on December 10, 1941. She also got a $1,000 advance so she could work full-time to complete the novel by January 1, 1943.[67][68]

text: Rand worked long hours through 1942 to complete the final two-thirds of her manuscript, which she delivered on December 31, 1942.[68][69] Rand's working title for the book was Second-Hand Lives, but Ogden pointed out that this emphasized the story's villains. Rand offered The Mainspring as an alternative, but this title had been recently used for another book. She then used a thesaurus and found 'fountainhead' as a synonym.[65] The Fountainhead was published on May 7, 1943, with 7,500 copies in the first printing. Initial sales were slow, but they began to rise in the fall of 1943, driven primarily by word of mouth.[70][71] The novel began appearing on bestseller lists in 1944.[72] It reached number six on The New York Times bestseller list in August 1945, over two years after its initial publication.[73] By 1956, the hardcover edition sold over 700,000 copies.[74] The first paperback edition was published by New American Library in 1952.[75]

text: A 25th anniversary edition was issued by New American Library in 1971, including a new introduction by Rand. In 1993, a 50th anniversary edition from Bobbs-Merrill added an afterword by Rand's heir, Leonard Peikoff.[76] The novel has been translated into more than 25 languages.[note 1]

text: Themes[edit]

text: Individualism[edit]

text: Rand indicated that the primary theme of The Fountainhead was "individualism versus collectivism, not in politics but within a man's soul".[78] Philosopher Douglas Den Uyl identified the individualism presented in the novel as being specifically of an American kind, portrayed in the context of that country's society and institutions.[79] Apart from scenes such as Roark's courtroom defense of the American concept of individual rights, she avoided direct discussion of political issues. As historian James Baker described it, "The Fountainhead hardly mentions politics or economics, despite the fact that it was born in the 1930s. Nor does it deal with world affairs, although it was written during World War II. It is about one man against the system, and it does not permit other matters to intrude."[80] Early drafts of the novel included more explicit political references, but Rand removed them from the finished text.[81]

text: Architecture[edit]

text: Rand chose the profession of architecture as the background for her novel, although she knew nothing about the field beforehand.[82] As a field that combines art, technology, and business, it allowed her to illustrate her primary themes in multiple areas.[83] Rand later wrote that architects provide "both art and a basic need of men's survival".[82] In a speech to a chapter of the American Institute of Architects, Rand drew a connection between architecture and individualism, saying time periods that had improvements in architecture were also those that had more freedom for the individual.[84]

text: Roark's modernist approach to architecture is contrasted with that of most of the other architects in the novel. In the opening chapter, the dean of his architecture school tells Roark that the best architecture must copy the past rather than innovate or improve.[85] Roark repeatedly loses jobs with architectural firms and commissions from clients because he is unwilling to copy conventional architectural styles. In contrast, Keating's mimicry of convention brings him top honors in school and an immediate job offer.[86] The same conflict between innovation and tradition is reflected in the career of Roark's mentor, Henry Cameron.[87]

text: Philosophy[edit]

text: Den Uyl calls The Fountainhead a "philosophical novel", meaning that it addresses philosophical ideas and offers a specific philosophical viewpoint about those ideas.[88] In the years following the publication of The Fountainhead, Rand developed a philosophical system that she called Objectivism. The Fountainhead does not contain this explicit philosophy,[89] and Rand did not write the novel primarily to convey philosophical ideas.[90] Nonetheless, Rand included three excerpts from the novel in For the New Intellectual, a 1961 collection of her writings that she described as an outline of Objectivism.[91] Peikoff used many quotes and examples from The Fountainhead in his 1991 book on Rand's philosophy, Objectivism: The Philosophy of Ayn Rand.[92]

text: Reception and legacy[edit]

text: Critical reception[edit]

text: The Fountainhead polarized critics and received mixed reviews upon its release.[93] The reviewer for The New York Times praised Rand as writing "brilliantly, beautifully and bitterly", stating that she had "written a hymn in praise of the individual" that would force readers to rethink basic ideas.[94] Benjamin DeCasseres, a columnist for the New York Journal-American, described Roark as "one of the most inspiring characters in modern American literature". Rand sent DeCasseres a letter thanking him for explaining the book's themes about individualism when many other reviewers did not.[95] There were other positive reviews, although Rand dismissed many of them as either not understanding her message or as being from unimportant publications.[93] A number of negative reviews focused on the length of the novel,[96] such as one that called it "a whale of a book" and another that said "anyone who is taken in by it deserves a stern lecture on paper-rationing". Other negative reviews called the characters unsympathetic and Rand's style "offensively pedestrian".[93]

text: In the years following its initial publication, The Fountainhead has received relatively little attention from literary critics.[97][98] Assessing the novel's legacy, philosopher Douglas Den Uyl described The Fountainhead as relatively neglected compared to her later novel, Atlas Shrugged, and said, "our problem is to find those topics that arise clearly with The Fountainhead and yet do not force us to read it simply through the eyes of Atlas Shrugged."[97] Among critics who have addressed it, some consider The Fountainhead to be Rand's best novel,[99][100][101] although in some cases this assessment is tempered by an overall negative judgment of Rand's writings.[102][103] Purely negative evaluations have also continued; a 2011 overview of American literature said "mainstream literary culture dismissed [The Fountainhead] in the 1940s and continues to dismiss it".[104]

text: Feminist criticisms[edit]

text: One of the most controversial elements of the book is the first sexual encounter between Roark and Dominique.[105] Feminist critics have attacked the scene as representative of an antifeminist viewpoint in Rand's works that makes women subservient to men.[106] Susan Brownmiller, in her 1975 work Against Our Will: Men, Women and Rape, denounced what she called "Rand's philosophy of rape", for portraying women as wanting "humiliation at the hands of a superior man". She called Rand "a traitor to her own sex".[107] Susan Love Brown said the scene presents Rand's view of sex as sadomasochism involving "feminine subordination and passivity".[108] Barbara Grizzuti Harrison suggested women who enjoy such "masochistic fantasies" are "damaged" and have low self-esteem.[109] While Mimi Reisel Gladstein found elements to admire in Rand's female protagonists, she said that readers who have "a raised consciousness about the nature of rape" would disapprove of Rand's "romanticized rapes".[110]

text: Rand's posthumously published working notes for the novel indicate that when she started on the book in 1936, she conceived of Roark's character that "were it necessary, he could rape her and feel justified".[111] She denied that what happened in the finished novel was actually rape, referring to it as "rape by engraved invitation".[105] She said Dominique wanted and "all but invited" the act, citing, among other things, a passage where Dominique scratches a marble slab in her bedroom to invite Roark to repair it.[112] A true rape, Rand said, would be "a dreadful crime".[113] Defenders of the novel have agreed with this interpretation. In an essay specifically explaining this scene, Andrew Bernstein wrote that although much "confusion" exists about it, the descriptions in the novel provide "conclusive" evidence of Dominique's strong attraction to Roark and her desire to have sex with him.[114] Individualist feminist Wendy McElroy said that while Dominique is "thoroughly taken," there is nonetheless "clear indication" that Dominique both gave consent for and enjoyed the experience.[115] Both Bernstein and McElroy saw the interpretations of feminists such as Brownmiller as based in a false understanding of sexuality.[115][116]

text: Impact on Rand's career[edit]

text: Although Rand had some mainstream success previously with her play Night of January 16th and had two previously published novels, The Fountainhead was a major breakthrough in her career. It brought her lasting fame and financial success. She sold the movie rights to The Fountainhead and returned to Hollywood to write the screenplay for the adaptation.[117] In April 1944, she signed a multiyear contract with movie producer Hal Wallis to write original screenplays and adaptations of other writers' works.[118]

text: The success of the novel brought Rand new publishing opportunities. Bobbs-Merrill offered to publish a nonfiction book expanding on the ethical ideas presented in The Fountainhead. Though this book was never completed, a portion of the material was used for an article in the January 1944 issue of Reader's Digest.[119] Rand was also able to get an American publisher for Anthem, which previously had been published in England, but not in the United States.[120] When she was ready to submit Atlas Shrugged to publishers, over a dozen competed to acquire the new book.[121]

text: The Fountainhead also attracted a new group of fans who were attracted to its philosophical ideas. When she moved back to New York in 1951, she gathered a group of these admirers of whom she referred publicly as "the Class of '43" in reference to the year The Fountainhead was published. The group evolved into the core of the Objectivist movement that promoted the philosophical ideas from Rand's writing.[122][123]

text: Cultural influence[edit]

text: The Fountainhead has continued to have strong sales throughout the last century into the current one. By 2008, it had sold over 6.5 million copies in English. It has also been referenced in a variety of popular entertainments, including movies, television series, and other novels.[124][125]

text: The year 1943 also saw the publication of The God of the Machine by Isabel Paterson and The Discovery of Freedom by Rose Wilder Lane. Rand, Lane, and Paterson have been referred to as the founding mothers of the American libertarian movement with the publication of these works.[126] Journalist John Chamberlain, for example, credited these works with converting him from socialism to what he called "an older American philosophy" of libertarian and conservative ideas.[127] Literature professor Philip R. Yannella said the novel is "a central text of American conservative and libertarian political culture".[104]

text: The book has a particular appeal to young people, an appeal that led historian James Baker to describe it as "more important than its detractors think, although not as important as Rand fans imagine".[100] Philosopher Allan Bloom said the novel is "hardly literature", but when he asked his students which books mattered to them, someone always was influenced by The Fountainhead.[128] Journalist Nora Ephron wrote that she had loved the novel when she was 18, but admitted that she "missed the point", which she suggested is largely subliminal sexual metaphor. Ephron wrote that she decided upon rereading that "it is better read when one is young enough to miss the point. Otherwise, one cannot help thinking it is a very silly book."[129]

text: The Fountainhead has been cited by numerous architects as an inspiration for their work. Architect Fred Stitt, founder of the San Francisco Institute of Architecture, dedicated a book to his "first architectural mentor, Howard Roark".[130] According to architectural photographer Julius Shulman, Rand's work "brought architecture into the public's focus for the first time". He said The Fountainhead was not only influential among 20th century architects, but also it "was one, first, front and center in the life of every architect who was a modern architect".[131] The novel also had a significant impact on the public perception of architecture.[132][133][134] During his campaign for U.S. President, real estate developer Donald Trump praised the novel, saying he identified with Roark.[135]

text: Adaptations[edit]

text: Film[edit]

text: In 1949, Warner Bros. released a film based on the book, starring Gary Cooper as Howard Roark, Patricia Neal as Dominique Francon, Raymond Massey as Gail Wynand, and Kent Smith as Peter Keating. Rand, who had previous experience as a screenwriter, was hired to adapt her own novel. The film was directed by King Vidor. It grossed $2.1 million, $400,000 less than its production budget.[136] Critics panned the movie. Negative reviews appeared in publications ranging from newspapers such as The New York Times and the Los Angeles Times, to movie industry outlets such as Variety and The Hollywood Reporter, to magazines such as Time and Good Housekeeping.[136][137]

text: In letters written at the time, Rand's reaction to the film was positive. She said it was the most faithful adaptation of a novel ever made in Hollywood[138] and a "real triumph".[139] Sales of the novel increased as a result of interest spurred by the film.[140] She displayed a more negative attitude later, saying she disliked the entire movie and complaining about its editing, acting, and other elements.[141] Rand said she would never sell rights to another novel to a film company that did not allow her to pick the director and screenwriter, as well as edit the film.[142]

text: Various filmmakers have expressed interest in doing new adaptations of The Fountainhead, although none of these potential films has begun production. In the 1970s, writer-director Michael Cimino wanted to film his own script for United Artists. In 1992, producer James Hill optioned the rights and selected Phil Joanou to direct.[143] In the 2000s, Oliver Stone was interested in directing a new adaptation; Brad Pitt was reportedly under consideration to play Roark.[144] In a March 2016 interview, director Zack Snyder also expressed interest in doing a new film adaptation of The Fountainhead.[145]

text: Other adaptations[edit]

text: In 1944, Omnibook Magazine produced an abridged edition of the novel that was sold to members of the United States Armed Forces. Rand was annoyed that Bobbs-Merrill allowed the edited version to be published without her approval of the text.[146] King Features Syndicate approached Rand the following year about creating a condensed, illustrated version of the novel for syndication in newspapers. Rand agreed, provided that she could oversee the editing and approve the proposed illustrations of her characters, which were provided by Frank Godwin. The 30-part series began on December 24, 1945, and ran in over 35 newspapers.[147] Rand biographer Anne Heller complimented the adaptation, calling it "handsomely illustrated".[146]

text: The novel was adapted in Urdu for the Pakistan Television Network in the 1970s, under the title Teesra Kinara. The serial starred Rahat Kazmi, who also wrote the adaptation.[148] Kazmi's wife, Sahira Kazmi, played Dominique.[149]

text: The Dutch theater company Toneelgroep Amsterdam presented an adaptation for the stage (in Dutch) at the Holland Festival in June 2014. The company's artistic director Ivo van Hove wrote and directed the adaptation. Ramsey Nasr starred as Howard Roark, with Halina Reijn as Dominique Francon.[150] After its debut the production went on tour, appearing in Barcelona, Spain, in early July 2014[151] and at the Festival d'Avignon in France later that month.[152] The play appeared at the Odéon-Théâtre de l'Europe in Paris in November 2016.[153] The four-hour production used video projections to show close-ups of the actors and Roark's drawings, as well as backgrounds of the New York skyline.[152][154] The Festival d'Avignon production received several positive notices, including reviews from the French newspapers La Croix,[154] Les Échos,[155] and Le Monde,[156] as well as from the English newspaper The Guardian, whose reviewer described it as "electrifying theatre".[157] The French magazine Télérama gave the Avignon production a negative review, calling the source material inferior and complaining about the use of video screens on the set,[158] while another French magazine, La Terrasse, complimented the staging and acting of the Odéon production.[153]