Kea is the closest of the Cyclades islands to the mainland; as a result, it is subjected to intense construction pressures, mainly for summer houses. Thus, a torrent bed at Coryssia, which used to be a natural area with a few agricultural fields, has now been gutted, backfilled and is receiving commercial and residential uses, as well as extensive storage areas for construction materials. The destruction of the initial landscape is complete. Incidentally, the local torrent is now receiving very little water, probably due to climate change.

The island of Lemnos is close to the Turkish coast and on an important bird migration route. Consequently, its wetlands are quite valuable as resting places for many threatened species. The Moudros coastal wetland, which adjoins the airport of the island, is being used as a garbage dump, thus degrading its characteristic landscapes and undermining its tourist attraction.

Prophet Elias, the highest point of the island, has been ‘decorated’ in recent years with telecommunication antennas and an experimental wind power generator. Recently, the number of antennas has been increased greatly to serve the needs of mobile phone communications. Large-scale wind generators are now planned in many of the Aegean Islands, and their impact on the sensitive landscapes will be significant, because –due to their dimensions– they affect the scale of the landscapes.

Milos, one more island in the Cyclades, is well-known because of its rich geology, resulting from ancient volcanic action. As a result, various minerals are extracted today, especially perlite and barytine. In the centre of the island, barytine extraction activities have created a new landscape element, a large artificial crater, with a small wetland at its centre. Efforts have been made by the extraction company to restore the vegetation around the crater with mixed results. Mineral extraction activities (especially marble, aggregates and bauxite) are affecting many Greek landscapes and restoration measures are often non-existent, weak or unsuccessful, with very few positive examples (some of which on Milos itself).

To cultivate the sloped land of many of the Aegean islands, terracing has been used since ancient times. The abandonment of the traditional agricultural practices has led to the arrest of maintenance of the terraces and of their retaining dry-stone walls. The result has been slow erosion, which still maintains a characteristic landscape element. This is now disappearing as the land is being sold for resort houses and the resulting construction and landscaping totally eliminates even the last traces of terracing.