If India can do it, why cannot Canada? India is refurbishing thirteen (13) lighthouses! Canada is demolishing hundreds! Why is India doing it? For tourism! Tourism is not important to Canada? 

India is doing this even though they have just installed a new Automatic Identification System (AIS) for most vessels on their coast. Lighthouses are still needed they said.

What happens when most of Canada’s beautiful lighthouses are demolished and the next government in ten years decides they are needed. Build more? Not likely knowing the Canadian government mentality. You will have a light atop a pole. So much for history!

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Lighthouses to get a facelift

from the Hindu Business Line

Chennai, India, August 05, 2012 

Some of the famous lighthouses in the country are getting a facelift.

The Government plans to develop 13 lighthouses into tourism spots through the private-public-partnership.

IL&FS has prepared a feasibility report on the project which is likely to cost over Rs 300 crore.

The iconic lighthouse on the Marina beach in Chennai and the Mamallapuram lighthouse, are among the famous lighthouses that will get a facelift. The lighthouse on Marina will house a lighthouse museum, said the Union Shipping Minister, G.K. Vasan.

Vasan, while inaugurating the Automatic Identification System network, said though lighthouses are located at remote locations, the landscape in the environs of the lighthouses are breathtaking.

In the first phase, 13 lighthouses, including four in Tamil Nadu (Chennai, Mamallapuram, Rameswaram and Muttam), will be covered under the scheme, he said.

Vasan said a lighthouse would be established at Vembar in Tuticorin district for which initial works are being carried out. He handed over the approval for the project to the Directorate General of Lighthouse and Lightship.

raja.simhan@thehindu.co.in