Good growing, Amherst:

Would you like a swamp with falling down trees on a thin soil, or a forest with health trees on a deep soil? The current "forever wild" plan for Nature View Park preserves forever swamp, a mistake. To read more go to <geocities.com/nuttreegordon/life1256.htm>

I was first concerned about the 1260 acres, which was eventually to be Nature View Park, way back in the '70s. An international gas pipe line and KV power line were pushed through. Why did they not cross side by side? Original plans showed them side by side, but that was changed due to the gas line being constructed before "wet land" laws which preceded power line construction. The power line would cross "wet lands" which the gas line had just crossed, so had to move 600 feet south to a drier Town of Amherst (TOA) ditch bank. Now "wet land" was not be disturbed, but the well drained, forested bank was felled, and two permanent tracks would impede development. Even more onerous were the "wet land" laws which effectively made 62% of this site a breeding ground for mosquitos. Intensive farming could still drain tile, and use the land, but it would get no help from government. I remember that taxes went up 500% just as the "wet land" restrictions were enacted. The farmers had to sell. Ditches were left blocked, and continue to be more blocked, expanding the vegetation that defines "wet land". This is when Urban Development and the University of Buffalo alumni gained the properties. Later this 1260 acres came to the TOA after payments in lieu of taxes, and costs of developing in a "wet land" became apparent.

Today, the same stagnant plans continue. WNY Land Conservancy, with its plan to preserve the present situation compounds this problem. They want benign neglect to be practiced at Nature View Park. Besides giving bad advice to the TOA, the nature conservancy is now suing the town for not fulfilling a contract, one that was never completed, meaning no fee was paid.

The Town has to touch three bases. The Town must act to preserve infrastructure. An environmental and fiscal budget must come before legislation. The legislation must be legal. If not, we are all going to pay to sort things out.

The infrastructure we preserve is life itself. The 1256 acres should not be a thin mat of decaying vegetation over anaerobic soil. It should be 1256 acres by 10 feet of aerated, root penetrated soil. It should be a main interest of the local schools to develop and study this property as a living biological resource. I am sure the school kids could advise on golf course leasing land which would become aerobic, and widely used. Golf courses are good stewards/managers. Schools need this project. Schools are as permanent as Nature View and have the time and people to find and build life while studying and advising. Golfers should enjoy developing and restoring a growing, living habitat, though I suspect they would not like their links turned to Frizby golf, and the kids would. Frizbys do less damage than golf balls to hikers. As new grass, shrubs and trees are developed as minimum care and permanent, golf should want to recycle into new lands and leases. The communication and education of our schools is the infrastructure the TOA neglects when it embraces benign neglect. We neglect too much. This new century is the age of biology, like the 1900s was the age of physics, and the 1800s was the age of chemistry. Niagara-On-The-Lake, Ontario is testing a sewage effluent reed bed in an unheated greenhouse. The water flows quickly in horizontally 12 months a year due to little ice in the solar structure, then slowly flows vertically down through the root layers, and out through drain tile after the roots through their associated fungi have absorbed the nutrients/pollutants. TOA continues with eighteenth century technology in treating effluent with chlorine which continues as a lethal menace out into our environment. This is an analogy for our non-comprehension of how nature works, eighteenth century thinking continuing a killer. We cannot neglect our resources/infrastructure/kids/comprehension. As it is currently advertised, Nature View Park is a quick and dirty sell, a poster child for non-comprehension.

What is the environmental impact of leaving a parcel forever wild? It depends on the parcel. This parcel does not work as it sits, or as benign neglect would have it sit. The environmental budget is as much a failure as the benign neglect is an understatement of the cost budget. If we neglect Nature View, cancer or mosquitos may kill us. Deer and four wheelers will harass us. Upkeep, policing and insurance will cost us. Interest will be as fleeting as in a bug infested desert. That said, I cut deep ditches on a nearby property, and control the mosquitos and deer flies with cliff swallows living in the ditch banks. Ditching has to be a yearly process, not benign neglect project. However, what is the place of a green lie in nature. Of course some of it should be preserved. The same can be said of an evil man. If we did not have one to observe, and save, we would be worse off for the lack of this experience. It is a relief that these poor will always be with us. We can build life into our green lies, then field trip out to such as found along Delaware Road in Clarence for a quick study in stagnant water, carbon dioxide saturated soil, and pole size trees with their roots rotting off.

I think it appropriate that the Conservancy is now suing the TOA. Rinky dink planning that proposes a forever wild green lie deserves no support, just controversy. It advises taking Nature View's management away from future town boards and town residents. This is illegal, as illegal as any voting disenfranchisement. It shows how little the WNY Land Conservancy cares for costs to Amherst residents. When were the fees paid (in either direction) which would make this terrible contract binding? Talk about wrapping ones self in a green cloche, this green cloche has put a tourniquet around the neck. It does turn one's face green, but you cannot be truly green when you espouse a brown land to be permanent. However, the real issue of many first-on-the-scene promoters of this project was to have no changes in their back yards, and only pay lip service to the greening of Amherst.

If you come to realize that an as is, forever wild Nature View Park is a big mistake, you better voice your ideas soon because the only high profile lobby is for an existing, essentially unchanged except by forces of nature, 1256 acres. I will try to list public meetings here: only found Friends of Nature View Park meetings, so far, devoted to things as is, forever wild, dissenters unwelcome.

Good growing,

John
John H Gordon Jr, LS, PE
1385 Campbell Blvd
Amherst, NY 14228-1403
716-691-9371
geocities.com/nuttreegordon for nursery file list. geocities.com/nuttreegordon/life1256.htm for this article.
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