Trail(er) trash

They let you *hike*? We always had to double-time. A-8-3, A-8-3 'ray for the army and f**k me!

L.W.(Bill) Hughes III proclaimed:

At

Of course it's not literally covered with people but the land is highly appropriated. Most of the East was cleared of major forests to introduce agriculture. Online satellite galleries offer definitive proof if you don't trust maps. Then again, it's impossible to convince an anthropocentric that any of it matters. All evidence will be met with "who cares - it's all about people and money."

I'm the uneducated one around here? An error like "75 million" (below) shows that population/land-use is not something you think about much.

That's because much of it is used to grow crops to feed them, and much is desert or high mountains. They also don't have the consumption footprint of the average American (but they're working on it, unfortunately). People have taken over just about all land that offers easy living and ample water. When land is truly empty it's usually for lack of water or harsh climate and terrain.

This is what's really happening in India:

Again, it takes a lot of land to support city infrastructure. Over 90% of U.S. forests have been worked over to that end. Agriculture occupies huge swaths of land. People keep wanting more of what's left for recreation and blaming everyone but themselves for crowds therein.

Have you ever heard of birth control? Every time this issue is bought up, some high-school dropout/Catholic assumes population control means genocide. You cited the U.S. population at a quarter of its actual size. How many other facets of this issue don't you understand?

Roads are significant because they bring more impact and break the land into smaller sectors. Once you build a road (paved or dirt) an area is never the same. Millions of dead animals don't appreciate them, either. I don't want to abolish roads but I'd like to see an end to new construction. We might actually have time to fix potholes.

That's another bogus argument (we can't destroy the whole thing, therefore we're harmless). Man-made damage is extensive compared to what once existed in terms of pristine land, now-extinct species and a lack of pollution. If you keep lowering the bar for acceptable damage, you can excuse almost anything.

R. Lander

=========================== No, it's a bogus map. Just like he said, the colors reflect nothing without a legend. Just waht does 'green' mean, what does 'black' mean? At a glance you'd think black meant it must be pure landfill, completly paved and overrun with people everywhere. Then, you see the entire inland passage up the coast totally black. No explanation given, no reason, no rhyme. Again, it's a bogus map.

snip rest of crap...

That exactly the point. Without any legend it can be anything you want it to be. I call it misleading.

It easily debunks the claim

I tried the above but there is no "Wilderness" check box. The only one that comes close is "Widerness Preservation System Areas". While it sounds close it is not the same thing. So the map is only showing protected wilderness areas, not just any wilderness area. Just because a "wilderness" area is not "protected" doesn't change the fact that it is still wilderness. I can see why you are so confused now. My advice is to forget the maps and the internet. Shut off your computer and go outside so that you can see for yourself it's not as bad as your maps show.

Most of the east coast????? You make it soumd like there are little to no trees left on the east coast. This couldn't be farther from the truth. I've hiked up and down most of the east coast in forested areas. Most were labled wilderness or wildlife areas. I've personally been there so I know they exist. Funny thing is they don't show up on your map.You really need to get outside more so you can see things for yourself.

So tell everyone just how you would implement such a plan ? Who would control such a thing ? How would you determine how many chidren one is allowed ? It just sounds like such a dumb assed idea.

You cited the U.S. population at a quarter of its actual

Why is it necessary to have federally protected wilderness areas anyway?

If people or groups want to protect areas they can purchase the land themselves with their own cash.

It reminds me of that 'protest' in California where all the ''movie stars' and 'recording artists' are sitting in a tree preventing a vacant lot from being improved into industrial storage.

They get on TV every day saying the city should buy it and how evil the landowner is but the truth is that if they were sincere each one of them can afford individually to purchase the land outright but they 'demand' the government buy it.

This is why we have government in the first place. I cannot afford my own police force, road crew, or annoying bureaucrats to pester my neighbors, so I get together with everyone else, pay taxes, and together we can buy a host of both good and bad things. There is, after all, a form of representative government in most places, so what it buys is, after a fashion, "what everyone wants".

The same argument, that you are using, could be applied to the city parks that your children or grandchildren play in, the roads that you drive on or the school where you learned to read. I imagine that your Hollywood celebrities would like to see their tax dollars spent on something worthwhile, as would we all.

Earle

That map suffers from scale. It's relatively useless other than to establish an extremely general sense of what you're talking about. For example, the portions of northern Maine with which I'm familiar and which would show green on your map are far below the resolution of most monitors. Nice thought, but it suffers in delivery; better there should be a map such as this with links to more detailed scale regional representations.

Agreed, the "footprint of man" is a more apt term than fingerprint or handprint.

Pete H

What are the criteria of the scale beneath the map? As it sits, they are meaningless numbers unless some referent be given. And, as with the North America map, scale prevents any but the most general inferences to be drawn. Despite "how densely packed" Europe is, it's a richer and more stable region than, say, India or southeastern China.

Generalities are fine for starters but pretty soon in such a discussion finer detail is needed.

Pete H

See my comment about resolution at the scale of the map provided. The map seems to provide a "goodish" blob of dark green in northern Maine yet there are only a few hundred acres (in scattered plots) of truly virgin, old-growth forest; similarly, we have NOWHERE in northern Maine that is more than five or six miles from the nearest driveable road. Under those criteria, the map is not a useful item.

Yours in the north Maine woods, Pete Hilton (Reg. Me. Guide) aka The Ent

Precisely because for the same reason that a group of slave owners argued that slavery was fine, that women didn't need the right to vote, and loggers and later miners ran rough shod over lands before the early

Do us a favor. If you come down with cancer don't take taxol. It came from a Federally protected area.

This has proven insufficient. It's like buying slaves for their freedom.

Well yes, this part is stupid.

And complete attribution of 160+ lines is unnecessary.

Earle,

As you know I live in a small village in the center of a protected wilderness area.

What you may not know is that every few years there are announcements of park expansion not by governmental seizures of private property but by the donations by individuals.

But we are not talking about community police and fire protection we are discussing 'celebrities' demanding the local government buy or seize private property in the center of an commercial/industrial zone. The owner is willing to sell and will gladly sell but the most recent offer I heard was less than 40% of the lands value.

If Joan Baez, Darryl Hannah, Ben Harper, Laura Dern and Danny Glover were truly committed to the preservation of this particular walnut tree they would donate the monies to purchase it. Each alone could afford to do it even without the tax breaks they would receive.

Worse yet is the local police refuse to remove, or arrest these 'stars' despite a court order for eviction.

This sounds a little like the ski area operator here, who is actually running an operation on government land. A neighbor doesn't want skiers and avalanche control crews on his owned land, so the ski area operator is getting the County to condemn it for him.

Why pay for something, when you can get it for free?

Earle

Actually, some of the worst places for trash are in wilderness areas, where the backpackers can't be bothered to carry out a few extra pounds.

Many years ago, I worked for a guy who used to fly his float plane into some of the alpine lakes around Snoqualmie Pass. He would meet some people doing trail maintenance (usually a Boy Scout troop) and fly hundreds of pounds of garbage out. Other than float planes, this area was inaccessible to vehicular traffic. Then, they converted it to a wilderness area. No more float planes allowed. Now, the area is like a cesspool/garbage dump.