🚀 go-pugleaf

Jeff Strickland wrote:

> The fact of the matter is, California is _expected_ to undergo
significant
> population growth in the next 20 years. The communities where this
growth is
> projected to go have already made plans to accomodate the expected
influx.
> The _problem_ these communities face is that they are near enough to
the job
> centers that people can make the daily trip back and forth to work,
but the
> road that goes from the housing centers to the job centers are by and
large
> rural two-lane farm roads that have been in place for decades. These
roads
> will see more cars in an hour than they were designed to see in a
day, once
> the homes are built.

Sorry for the delayed reply but you're missing the bigger point. I am
not so much protesting the roads themselves, as the population growth
that people keep accepting as inevitable or desirable. Roads and houses
unfortunately will be built because people are the center of the
universe <sarcasm>. But I'm tired of people who think the human
population "must" keep growing indefinitely because the economy "must"
also grow indefinitely. This mentality takes much of its origin from
the Bible.

See: http://enough_already.tripod.com/genesis.htm

Apparently, Arnold wants to have it both ways. He thinks we can
accommodate more and more people (living the standard sprawl lifestyle)
while protecting nature from their very impact. It just doesn't work
that way. Anyone who tries to spend time in real wilderness in
California knows this well. You have to go farther and father into the
country to find it because the "country" keeps becoming the city. Who
is crazy enough to think the environment can be kept in its current
state when we have 50 million Californians by 2025?

> You can bury your head in the sand and scream about the environment
while
> the impact on the environment becomes progressively greater as cars
standing
> in long lines traverse sorely over used farming roads and people die
as a
> result of horrendeous wrecks, or you can help preserve what is left
of the
> environment by calling for environmentally sensitive roads that not
only
> cross the new communities, but also connect those communities to the
job
> centers.

People dying in wrecks on overcrowded roads is not an environmental
issue in my context. I'm talking about the loss of wilderness and
animal habitat to human overpopulation. But you rather treat it as
inevitable and therein lies the problem.

> An environmentally sensitive road will have undercrossings so
> animals can migrate back and forth, it will not have exits where
there are
> never going to be homes. We can build new homes in one area, and
refuse to
> build them in others, but still have a road cut across the area where
there
> are no homes, but that road has no exits in the middle, only at the
ends.
> For example, I live in a community that is 20 miles from a job
center, but
> the roads that go there take over 60 miles and two hours due to
traffic. The
> short route is through a national forest and/or a wilderness area. If
a road
> was built that had no exits except at each end, and could accomodate
the
> wildlife in the area by having underpasses or overpasses if that
would be
> better, then the wilderness could be preserved, and humanity's needs
of
> getting from one place to another could be met. The compromise is
that the
> wilderness would not be impacted any more than is absolutely
necessary.

With ever-shrinking land acreage to build "environmentally sensitive"
roads on, that concept is largely a joke. I'd rather see people stop
breeding (worldwide) so we don't have to keep expanding infrastructure
in the first place. We are running out of new, green valleys just over
the hill.

Also, roads and houses are just one part of the problem. More people
means more crowding in wilderness areas as they try to escape
population centers on weekends and holidays. There is really no such
thing as "localized" growth impact because people don't stay rooted in
one place. And food, timber and water must be taken from distant areas
to feed the growth.

> Plan B, which seems to be the environmentalist's plan of choice, is
to build
> no roads, no homes, nothing. Ever. Period. That approach is simply
> unreasonable. Of course, the plan that calls for building everything
we can
> everywhere we can withoug regard for anything is equally
unreasonable, but
> at the complete opposite end of the spectrum. The actual course of
action is
> a plan somewhere between these two.

My course of action is to get to the root of the matter and ask that
people live and breed in true balance with nature instead of
infiltrating it with endless growth. If you want to see the
effectiveness of the "more roads solution," just drive in L.A. for a
day. Finite land cannot be infinitely parceled. California is heading
toward a future of megapolis suburbs that cover the very farmland we
need to feed ourselves. Routes to the mountains and beaches will only
become more crowded as 500,000+ people are jammed into the state each
year. We no longer live in a frontier. It's a sick situation from an
ecological view.

Again, this is about far more than just roads and houses. It takes a
lot of extraneous land to support human needs. There are just too many
of us.

E.A.

http://enough_already.tripod.com/
If any other species behaved like Man we'd call it a plague.