SavageLlama
05-09-2004, 17:10
Not sure what I think of this editorial on the AT that I came across..
A WILDERNESS FOOTPATH NO MORE
Editorial by David Nova
May 3, 2004
Roanoke Times & World News (javascript:NewWindow( 'FIISrcDetails','?from=article&ids=rnke');void(0);)
"A footpath for those who seek fellowship with the wilderness," is embossed on the bronze plaque atop Springer Mountain - the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. The trail descends from this Georgia peak and meanders 2,174 miles through 14 states over a continual spine of mountains to Mount Katahdin in northern Maine.
Mount Oglethorpe, 14 miles south of Springer, was the original southern terminus. Decades of devastation from logging, chicken farming and commercial development made the area around Oglethorpe resemble anything but wilderness. In 1958, this southernmost section of the trail was abandoned.
The Appalachian Trail may always be one of the great treasures of the East Coast, yet its days as a footpath in the wilderness have long since passed. The Appalachian Trail Conference now euphemistically describes the "wilderness" of the AT "as a series of long, skinny islands of wildness, surrounded by a sea of populated valleys inhabited by working farms and suburban communities."
It was not always this way. When Benton MacKaye first proposed the construction of "a continuous wilderness footpath along the Appalachian Mountain Range" in his 1921 journal article "An Appalachian Trail: A Project in Regional Planning," there were few cars, fewer roads and scant evidence of a suburbia extending beyond the metropolitan areas of the East Coast. MacKaye envisioned the AT as "the barrier of barriers" against the encroaching "metropolitan invasion."
In his 1928 book "The New Exploration," MacKaye likened this metropolitan invasion "to a glacier. It is spreading, unthinking, ruthless. Its substance consists of tenements, bungalows, stores, factories, billboards, filling-stations, eating-stands, and other structures whose individual hideousness and collective haphazardness" engender "the slum of commerce."
In 1935, he vehemently and unsuccessfully opposed the construction of Skyline Drive beside the AT in Virginia. Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway now crisscross and parallel the Appalachian Trail for 200 miles. Back then, the parkway was considered "sprawl." Today, citizen groups seek to protect the parkway from sprawl. Oh, how our perspectives change after decades of concessions.
Since construction of the Appalachian Trail began, Virginia's population has increased more than 300 percent from 2.3 million to 7.2 million. Virginians don't characterize such unbridled growth as "overpopulation." We believe overpopulation happens in other countries like India and Bangladesh. Instead, we compensate and mask our population problems by building more homes, wider interstates and deeper reservoirs.
Yet, merely counting population growth is not enough. Our effect on the environment is far more a function of our levels of consumption. The average American consumes as much of our planet's natural resources as 30 people living in India. One of the many casualties of our consumption levels is the demise of Virginia's wilderness.
Since my through hike of the Appalachian Trail 20 years ago, I have seen the tedious expansion of another house here, another cell tower there, all in close proximity to the trail. These days, my hikes in Virginia are nostalgic and cathartic, but I no longer characterize them as "fellowship with the wilderness." Instead, I seek that fellowship in remote areas of the Rocky Mountains, the High Sierras, the Cascades of the Pacific Northwest and the Mojave Desert.
During a recent hike in California's vast Joshua Tree National Park, I sought evidence of encroaching sprawl. By day, all I could see were passing airplanes. By night, the only evidence that anyone else inhabited the planet came from satellites passing amid countless stars - evidence no longer visible in Virginia's sky due to ambient light from homes, businesses and street lamps.
In 1968, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the National Trails System Act that now protects the Appalachian Trail and its West Coast counterpart, the 2,650-mile Pacific Crest Trail. Thankfully, there is now a near-continuous 1,000-foot corridor of federally protected land through which the AT travels.
Though the trail has never enjoyed greater protection, it has also never been more endangered. The AT is in jeopardy of becoming little more than a thin linear oasis in an expanding wasteland of shopping malls and housing developments. If MacKaye's original vision of thoughtful and deliberate regional planning is not embraced, another 80 years of growth and consumption will reduce the AT to little more than a long suburban park.
Before his death in 1975, Benton MacKaye voiced a quivering note of optimism regarding the future of the Appalachian Trail: "With pollution and overpopulation spawning a sprawling urban desert, I am encouraged by the knowledge that there are millions in America who care about the wilderness and mountains . . . ." Yes, and millions and millions and millions.
A WILDERNESS FOOTPATH NO MORE
Editorial by David Nova
May 3, 2004
Roanoke Times & World News (javascript:NewWindow( 'FIISrcDetails','?from=article&ids=rnke');void(0);)
"A footpath for those who seek fellowship with the wilderness," is embossed on the bronze plaque atop Springer Mountain - the southern terminus of the Appalachian Trail. The trail descends from this Georgia peak and meanders 2,174 miles through 14 states over a continual spine of mountains to Mount Katahdin in northern Maine.
Mount Oglethorpe, 14 miles south of Springer, was the original southern terminus. Decades of devastation from logging, chicken farming and commercial development made the area around Oglethorpe resemble anything but wilderness. In 1958, this southernmost section of the trail was abandoned.
The Appalachian Trail may always be one of the great treasures of the East Coast, yet its days as a footpath in the wilderness have long since passed. The Appalachian Trail Conference now euphemistically describes the "wilderness" of the AT "as a series of long, skinny islands of wildness, surrounded by a sea of populated valleys inhabited by working farms and suburban communities."
It was not always this way. When Benton MacKaye first proposed the construction of "a continuous wilderness footpath along the Appalachian Mountain Range" in his 1921 journal article "An Appalachian Trail: A Project in Regional Planning," there were few cars, fewer roads and scant evidence of a suburbia extending beyond the metropolitan areas of the East Coast. MacKaye envisioned the AT as "the barrier of barriers" against the encroaching "metropolitan invasion."
In his 1928 book "The New Exploration," MacKaye likened this metropolitan invasion "to a glacier. It is spreading, unthinking, ruthless. Its substance consists of tenements, bungalows, stores, factories, billboards, filling-stations, eating-stands, and other structures whose individual hideousness and collective haphazardness" engender "the slum of commerce."
In 1935, he vehemently and unsuccessfully opposed the construction of Skyline Drive beside the AT in Virginia. Skyline Drive and the Blue Ridge Parkway now crisscross and parallel the Appalachian Trail for 200 miles. Back then, the parkway was considered "sprawl." Today, citizen groups seek to protect the parkway from sprawl. Oh, how our perspectives change after decades of concessions.
Since construction of the Appalachian Trail began, Virginia's population has increased more than 300 percent from 2.3 million to 7.2 million. Virginians don't characterize such unbridled growth as "overpopulation." We believe overpopulation happens in other countries like India and Bangladesh. Instead, we compensate and mask our population problems by building more homes, wider interstates and deeper reservoirs.
Yet, merely counting population growth is not enough. Our effect on the environment is far more a function of our levels of consumption. The average American consumes as much of our planet's natural resources as 30 people living in India. One of the many casualties of our consumption levels is the demise of Virginia's wilderness.
Since my through hike of the Appalachian Trail 20 years ago, I have seen the tedious expansion of another house here, another cell tower there, all in close proximity to the trail. These days, my hikes in Virginia are nostalgic and cathartic, but I no longer characterize them as "fellowship with the wilderness." Instead, I seek that fellowship in remote areas of the Rocky Mountains, the High Sierras, the Cascades of the Pacific Northwest and the Mojave Desert.
During a recent hike in California's vast Joshua Tree National Park, I sought evidence of encroaching sprawl. By day, all I could see were passing airplanes. By night, the only evidence that anyone else inhabited the planet came from satellites passing amid countless stars - evidence no longer visible in Virginia's sky due to ambient light from homes, businesses and street lamps.
In 1968, President Lyndon Johnson signed into law the National Trails System Act that now protects the Appalachian Trail and its West Coast counterpart, the 2,650-mile Pacific Crest Trail. Thankfully, there is now a near-continuous 1,000-foot corridor of federally protected land through which the AT travels.
Though the trail has never enjoyed greater protection, it has also never been more endangered. The AT is in jeopardy of becoming little more than a thin linear oasis in an expanding wasteland of shopping malls and housing developments. If MacKaye's original vision of thoughtful and deliberate regional planning is not embraced, another 80 years of growth and consumption will reduce the AT to little more than a long suburban park.
Before his death in 1975, Benton MacKaye voiced a quivering note of optimism regarding the future of the Appalachian Trail: "With pollution and overpopulation spawning a sprawling urban desert, I am encouraged by the knowledge that there are millions in America who care about the wilderness and mountains . . . ." Yes, and millions and millions and millions.