And so this is Earth Day

[Catrin]

Rustbelt,
I appreciate your intent.

The local habitat for humanity has built at least one straw bale home here. Our ex-regional building director was a great proponent of alternative building styles. He always talked about the building industry being the most archaic industry in the world…..I think he was right.

Land conservation trusts are at an all time high in Colorado and my guess is that they are everywhere. Two years ago the farmland trust helped put together the first annual conference on integrated professions that deal with land issues…..but it wasn't just environmentalists ..they invited economists, planners and developers. They didn't all agree, although it stayed more positive than this thread.

Thanks to a group of diverse people, our city has done some remarkable things to promote infill dev. downtown. Developers can't build enough downtown living spaces to meet the demand…..Sorry Beaner, we have converted a historic hotel into sec.8 senior housing, an old candy factory into low/mod apts, plus affordable non subsidized apts as well as upscale apartments…..don't hit me with the elitist loft story. We still have greenfield development but it is relatively compact due to our water agreements (you must annex to get City water).

I think we (our country) have improved development in most aspects.
Auto reliance will continue to be a problem until we quit subsidizing them and charge people the real costs of owning and driving one…or several.

I wish that my city had better success in redeveloping older neighborhoods without letting them hit rock bottom first. This is personal for me. I live in an old house in an old neighborhood. When we redid our bathroom with new efficient appliances our water pressure fell to a dribble. In town, our water pressure is 35psi….new development receives about 95psi…..If I ever move to the edge, it will be to take a shower and get the shampoo residue out of my hair.

[adaptor]

El Guapo wrote:

Beaner -I don't agree with your argument that more jobs lead to more people and a degraded environment. The US is overall at a zero growth level - not counting immigration. It appears to me that immigration is the driving force of the ever expanding city. More people lead to more growth and sprawl. Not that I'm against it. It just is where our growth is coming from.

Demographers in this neck of the (stumpy second growth) woods have observed that though over the last 30 years our population has not grown, our urbanized areas have -- tremendously. It's the definition of sprawl: People choose homes further away from the developed urban core (in places like Sylvian Woods and Rolling Hills in memory of the things that were obliterated for their developments), on larger lots with greater driving distances to jobs, schools and amenities. Meanwhile a few immigrants trickle into the old urban core, but not nearly at replacement levels.

I suspect it's the same across the country. We're sprawling because we demand more and more and care less and less about where it comes from. In that respect I can appreciate some of Beaner's seeming disdain for the cancer like behavior of humans. But we do have the capacity to understand and alter our behavior to effect a different outcome. It's called Planning.

El Guapo wrote:
Rustbelt - perhaps you could tell us what you are doing personally to ease the burden on mother earth. Are you leading by example?

PS - There is no pleasing some people - Rustbelt and Gurnee bitched about what I posted. In an effort to make them happy I removed it. Credibility Beaner? I am what I am. I'm sorry if that offends you.

I wish I could say that in my professional life I am leading by example, but the turgid, bloated bureaucies here consider anything smacking of environmentalism (or historic preservation or several other quality of life indicators) to be a drag on economic development. Home Rule pits local governments against each other rather than encouraging regionalsim.

On a personal level, like Catrin, I chose an older home in an urban neighborhood (thankfully with better water pressure), recycle and try to compost and I do some volunteer work with a local park system. Boring stuff, eh?

I wouldn't presume to bitch about anyone's posts. I just suggest there may be reasons this forum may not have the level of serious participation some members desire.

[Cardinal]

OK, we are growing. 260 million people in this country alone. There is some natural growth, more so in some places, and there is immigration. On top of that, demographers will tell you that household size is shrinking - fewer children in families, more older couples living longer, singles (me, Dan, Plannergirl, etc.). All of these create a demand for more housing. Add to that the desire of many people to improve their condition - upgading from substandard housing, moving to better, safer neighborhoods, moving to find better jobs with more opportunity, etc.

The question is not whether more housing (and related development) is neeed, but where and in what form. That is where we come into the picture. As planners, we work with the market to steer growth. Where? To home improvement, downtown and neighborhood revitalization, infill sites, and yes, greenfields. We also shape the character of that development. Density, design, pedestrian and vehicular movement, parks, environmental protection and conservation, etc. Do we sometimes do a poor job as a profession? Certainly. Can we do better? Yes. But environment is just one of the factors we weigh in our work, not the only one. There are other issues of importance.

[Jen]

In beaner's first post on this thread he mentioned something about consumption which made me think of an article by Mark Sagoff Do We Consume Too Much?

The last paragraph: " The world has the wealth and the resources to provide everyone the opportunity to live a decent life. We consume too much when market relationships displace the bonds of community, compassion, culture, and place. We consume too much when consumption becomes an end in itself and makes us lose affection and reverence for the natural world"

In Michigan the DEQ receives applications to alter wetlands at the rate of two a day. The greatest number of applications are to fill in wetlands. Most are approved unless there is vigorous public opposition. This sounds like business as usual to me. Just yesterday was a public notice in the GR Press about an application to dredge and fill a wetland in order to build a road and culvert to create a nine home subdivision. But to make it more palatable to the public the develop is going to recreate those wetlands on another part of the property!!?!!

They are hoping to build upscale homes that are gonna get a pond view with grass up to the water's edge. Good job preserving wetlands eh?

[giff57]

Jen wrote:


They are hoping to build upscale homes that are gonna get a pond view with grass up to the water's edge. Good job preserving wetlands eh?

That happens so often it is not even funny. What that creates in most of the US is "Urban Goose Nirvana". They won't be so happy when hordes of geese crap all over the lawn....

[Cardinal]

How about a little consistency? Maybe in Michigan you can fill just about anything, but in Wisconsin you can't fill anything. Unless, of course, you are the DOT, or you want to turn a pristine wetland into a cranberry bog.

I am working right now with a company wanting to make an investment equal to almost 2% of the city's assessed valuation. The problem is, less than one acre of wetlnd originally on the site has expanded to about 7.5 over the past couple of years, really due to road construction that has impacted the site's hydrology. From originally asking to fill just under 2 acres of this created wetland, we are now down to asking to fill about 0.7-0.8 acres, and compensate for it by recountouring the wetland boundaries. Instead of realizing that this is already a net gain of wetlands to the state, we are still struggling for approval.

What is wrong with using a little reason? What is wrong with trying to balance different values (i.e., environment, jobs, tax base, etc.). Just as rampant filling is a poor choice, environmental extremism is not the answer.

[NHPlanner]

bturk wrote:

We are public servants hired to perform duties asassigned by a body politic of this representative democaracy.

And thus the reality of the planning profession. Until such a time that we have an educated body politic, enviornment will continue to lose out to economic development and housing development.

The issue here is not whether we're doing our jobs as environmentalists, but rather are we doing enough as a profession to help those in the general public understand the ramifications of the continued patterns of development.

Flames aside, ideologies aside, most planners, IMHO, would like to tackle the environmental issues more that they are able to today.

[Tranplanner]

NHPlanner wrote:
Flames aside, ideologies aside, most planners, IMHO, would like to tackle the environmental issues more that they are able to today.

I would definitely agree with that.

I used to work for one of those screwy DOTs (well, just a regional municipality) that would undertake an EA after having already decided to widen a road - just make the data support that conclusion, would ya? I managed to get one road widening delayed, and spooked a few engineers when I attempted a more realistic approach to travel projections...

NH Planner has a very good point about education - we planners can talk all we want about the negative impacts of growth, but until the public at large is more concious of impacts of their choices (there's that s-word again) their won't be much of a difference made.