Letter from the Editor: Winter 2009

The Land We Love -- and the Footprint We Leave

Place matters profoundly, whether it is a place we come from or one we travel to. Yet a single landscape can have wildly divergent meanings for different people. Energy companies eye the vast public lands of the western United States, with their rich reserves of natural gas, and erect towering drill rigs. To a conservationist, this is desecration of a landscape that is the spiritual equivalent of a cathedral. For ranchers, the western prairies and river valleys represent a livelihood, a cultural identity, and a legacy that outsiders can never fully grasp. Tourists and outdoor adventurers -- hikers, rafters, rock climbers, bikers, motorheads -- project onto these western landscapes their longing for something more authentic, rugged, or liberating than their own familiar surroundings.

It's not surprising that as more and more people come to occupy these finite spaces, the places themselves become endangered or at least fundamentally altered. David Gessner explores these themes in our cover story, "Loving the West to Death." Traveling by car between Moab, Utah, and Boulder, Colorado, Gessner turns his gimlet eye to the full gamut of human enterprise -- the recreators, tour guides, journalists, poets, and economists whom he encounters in national parks, on sidewalks, in restaurants and hotels. By the end of his journey, Gessner has drawn a rough map of the new West and forecast its prospects. He doesn't offer clear-cut prescriptions -- there are none -- but outlines some of the inherent tensions and paradoxes. The ethos of wildness resists restraint, yet without restraint (in the prosaic form of regulation) true wilderness may recede to the point of vanishing. He begins a provocative conversation that I expect others to vigorously join.

England has its iconic landscapes, too. In "Britain's Elusive Eco-Town Dream," contributing editor Bruce Stutz describes the countryside on the outskirts of London: "Like any ancient monument," he writes, "this land commands respect and zealous protection." Countryside is different from wilderness, but the Brits who occupy this more tamed landscape are also struggling to preserve what remains of its natural beauty while accommodating the pressures of more and more humans. All their houses, cars, and gadgets run on energy that, directly or indirectly, adds carbon dioxide to the atmosphere and accelerates climate change. There is a lot more at stake here than pretty views, meadow wildlife, or rare birds; more than walkable streets, proximity to good neighbors, decent schools, and appealing shops. How much we walk or bicycle, how long we drive, how much land we build on and how much water we consume -- these measures of our impact predict to no small degree the future of the planet.

This issue of OnEarth explores our physical, psychological, intellectual, and economic relationship to place. So tell us: what is your relationship to a particular landscape -- whether it's your backyard or the Grand Canyon? Post a blog on our new citizen journalism site, OnEarth.org/greenlight, e-mail me at OnEarth@nrdc.org, or simply comment on our stories at OnEarth.org. I'd love to hear from you.