|
by Michael Weishan
Editor-in-Chief
For the last several years I have had the great fortune to be
invited to spend a part of each summer at the home of a friend
in northwestern Montana. It's an almost magical place: built at
the turn of the century, the main lodge and so called "cabins"
(more like full sized houses, complete with fireplaces, multiple
bedrooms and lovely baths) are located on a deep, clear 12 mile
long lake, which gently laps secluded, wooded shores. My friend
is a truly wonderful hostess, who thoughtfully allows her guests
to sun, row, swim, bike, walk or just laze about during the day,
providing as much or as little company and guidance as required.
Evenings are full of wonderful food, good friends and good cheer.
Time here can be as busy, or as restful, as we care to make it.
The closest town is Big Fork, which in the last several years
has changed from a typical sleepy western village to a bustling
resort center and artists' colony, complete with a terrific gourmet
restaurant, summer theater, and even a sidewalk creperie.
(Some people lament the passing of the rugged-around-the-edges
town - personally, I don't mind too much - the old buildings have
all been beautifully preserved, renovated and reused, and I must
admit that I rather like having my copy of the New York Times
and a good crepe or bagel after my morning bike ride). There is
only one problem with all this - outside of the town center, which
is protected by zoning laws and covenants, a large portion of
the bucolic countryside is being lost to trashy development.
Everywhere you go in this area, you see "for sale" signs
in the front of farms and ranches whose wonderful rolling fields,
green and chartreuse with the bloom of mustard and hay, spread
out majestically to the purple mountains and deep blue lakes in
the distance. These properties are not just being transferred
from one owner to another - they are being subdivided for houses,
golf courses, and shopping complexes. Like so many other places
in this country (my own town of Southborough, Massachusetts is
an unfortunate example as well), our valuable agricultural land
is being eaten up at a frightening rate by miles and miles of
ugly, ugly urban sprawl. I don't mind the development so much
in itself. I am rather resigned to the fact that given our seeming
inability or desire to control our population growth, ever larger
numbers of people are going to require ever larger numbers of
houses, shops, etc. What I do mind though, and what I am determined
to fight against, is this god-awful, horrific urban sprawl of
gas stations, shopping malls, stores, and cardboard housing subdivisions
- all surrounded by mile after mile of asphalt, dotted with horrible
little stick shrubs and sickly red mulch. This type of progress
may have to exist, but it doesn't have to be such an eyesore,
and take up so much valuable natural space.
It should be as plain as the noses on our faces that we need beauty
in our lives - whether man-made beauty from the simple comforts
that a well-designed home and beautiful garden provide us, or
natural beauty, like that of rolling farm fields, meadows, and
woodlands, or of the still-wild places in the world where man
is not in control. Anyone who has been in a National Park recently,
like Glacier here in Montana (which is one of the less visited
parks and yet received over a MILLION visits last year) realizes
that many people still feel this need to be in beautiful, natural
surroundings.
Yet will our National Parks soon be the only places such loveliness
exists? Equally beautiful natural areas exist all over the country,
yet they are being eaten up by greedy, short-sighted developers
who care nothing for the long term effects of their building,
as long as their own profits are secure - and we all, you, I and
our children-to-come pay the price. What can be done? They say
charity begins at home, and this is certainly the case with the
saving and enhancing our environment, both the completely natural
one, and the man-made environment of our cities, towns and suburbs.
There is something that each and every one of you reading this
can do, literally right in your own backyards. In a way, by your
interest in this journal, you have already started: the attempt
to beautify our home grounds in an environmentally sensitive way,
both for the enrichment of ourselves and of our neighbors, is
one of the surest ways to fight the general aesthetic degradation
we see all around us.
On a larger scale, it is important that those of you with time
and resources become involved in your local planning, zoning,
and historical boards or commissions. Most people don't realize
it, but these local groups have a tremendous ability to influence
how much or how little of this destruction we will have to endure,
through the implementation and enforcement of zoning rules regulating
such things as commercial store locations, density of office parks,
amount of landscaping required around commercial structures, minimum
lot size for residential use, wet-land protection and so forth.
Serving on these boards and committees (or even just attending
the meetings on crucial issues) requires dedication and effort,
but if more of us who are concerned about preserving the beauty
around us don't become involved very soon, there won't be much
left to save, just a deadly black stretch of asphalt and billboards
from sea to polluted sea.
I am not saying that we have to shut down all development and
economic growth. What I am saying is that these things can be
achieved without completely destroying the beauty which used to
be found in both our cities and our countrysides. Shops and stores
can survive and even prosper without destroying historic structures
and erecting huge, ugly neon signs along every square foot of
roadway; architecturally, houses and subdivisions can be designed
and built that preserve as much open space as possible; roads
can be constructed around instead of through wetlands (or better
yet, commuter rail lines can be built instead); commercial zones
can be concentrated together instead of strung out infinitely
along our once-scenic highways (which is better both for merchant
and shopper); farmland can be preserved to feed future generations
(has anyone considered where all the food to feed the increasing
billions is going to come from if all we have is miles of paving
and tire-repair shops??). If we have the ingenuity and resourcefulness
to chart the mysteries of the Martian landscape, we can certainly
figure out how to preserve, protect and enhance our own landscape
here on earth. We can have our crepes and eat them too - I'm sure
of it, if we all just try. We, the silent majority, must speak
out. No one is going to make the effort for us, and we will have
no one to blame but ourselves if we don't.
|
