Nonlocal loss of first homotopy in polyhedral approximations of Peano continua

Abstract

If a Peano continuum $X$ is semilocally simply connected, then it has a finite polyhedral approximation whose fundamental group is isomorphic to that of $X$. In general, this fails to be true. It is known that the fundamental group of a locally complicated Peano continuum may contain nontrivial elements that are persistently undetectable by polyhedral approximations, at all scales. However, we show that such failure is not inherently local.