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A second challenge of river restoration concerns human habitation. In the examples discussed by Elliott and Katz, it is supposed that what is to be restored is an isolated fragment of wilderness. In the case of mining operations, this will often be the case, for valuable mineral deposits are often located far from human civilization in areas of more or less untouched wilderness. Similarly, the two islands of Elliott’s thought experiment are clearly desert islands. In most cases, however, river restorations will not be of wild rivers that have been temporarily destroyed or degraded but could in theory be fully restored to their wild state, for permanent human settlement – in the form of agriculture, industry, cities, and so on – will typically have established itself along the banks and in the surrounding catchment area, a situation that significantly affects restoration projects on such rivers as the Cole, the Brent, and the Alt in the United Kingdom (Eden et al. 2000; Eden 2006). When combined with the first key attribute of rivers – their connectedness to the surrounding watershed – this will typically make the idea of restoring them to a wild state completely out of the question (Eden et al. 2000; Eden 2006).