[at-l] A Question Of Trail

[texas12step@hotmail.com (Texas Twelve-Step)]

RoksnRoots wrote:
> Texas Twelve-Step wrote:

>> Property rights are not incompatible with protecting the
>> trail from development so long as you're willing to bear
>> the true cost of preserving wilderness.

> ~~~  I don't understand this. Are you saying we need to
> pay adequately for these lands? 

Why yes, that's exactly what I'm saying -- assuming that
by "adequately" you mean a price determined by mutual
consent of the parties involved.

> Or are you suggesting that preserving a narrow corridor in a 
> remote range that wasn't ever prone to development, but is
> now a good political proving ground for extortionate land
> ransoming,

Who insisted that Appalachian Trail conservation be made
the prerogative of politicians? What gives trail advocates
the right to piss and moan about how conservation has 
become such an icky political contest, when it was they
who begged the government to involve itself in the first
place? You can't have it both ways.

[...]

>>>            There is also a weird anti-environmental trend
>>> happening that is the sad result of the public being convinced
>>> that it's a choice between $ and environment.
 
>> Aren't you guilty of promoting this belief with talk of 
>> "greasy bucks" and suchlike?

> ~~~  A buck becomes greasier and greasier when high powered,
> politically connected lawyers make back room deals paid for
> by the developer while the nation's showcase wilderness corridor
> gets short shrift for political expediency by modern-day 
> politicians who have lost their sense of responsibility for
> the Trail and sold out for short-term popularity. 

Again, what did you expect would happen when trail 
advocates banded together and foisted Appalachian Trail
conservation onto the state as a matter of public policy? 

> These people have aggressively attacked the AT and what it
> stands for. If you want to see guilt, go look at the local
> towns peoples' words in the NPS review; look at the developer's
> manipulation of public opinion and false speculations over 
> ski-area development he never intended; look at the meager,
> mild reaction by ATC to a serious incursion in a prime AT
> location. You can't possibly be seriously posing that this 
> is our fault and we deserved being hornswoggled by what is
> probably a predesigned and approved regional plan to employ
> locals in home construction at the Trail's expense?

What's the matter? I thought you liked "regional planning."

> You tell me then, what would it have taken to preserve the
> AT on Saddleback? 

"Waging her battle with money, she said, means she doesn't
have to argue with people about her philosophy of protecting
the land."

http://www.bangornews.com/cgi-bin/article.cfm?storynumber=37557

[...]
 
>>>     Mr Breen appealed to greed and won.
 
>> This is true. It is also equally true that trail advocates
>> appealed to greed and *lost.* They acted in the hope that
>> if enough of them petitioned the government, they'd get the 
>> mountain and a chunk of the surrounding viewshed without 
>> having to pay for it. If the Trailplace campaign was any
>> indication, most petitioners couldn't even restrain their
>> *greed* to limiting the use of eminent domain to condemning 
>> only the minimum amount of land "mandated" by "law."

>   ~~~  Without having to pay for it? What was given to
> Breen? 

Not *your* money. You may argue that perhaps one quarter-
millionth of your federal taxes in 2000 went to Breen, but
I would remind you that the government was going to take
that money from you regardless of the terms of settlement.
The exorbitance of Breen's compensation had *zero* effect
on yours or any other petitioner's pocketbook.

> There's strong evidence that Breen had no means to build 
> out that entire mountain. Do you understand what that means?

Yes. Do you?

> I'll tell you. That means a scam was perpetuated in order
> to manipulate public feelings towards the AT in order to 
> fetch a higher price for his deal. 

Cry me a river. That Breen's land was to be taken by the
state was a foregone conclusion. Why shouldn't he try to
maximize his compensation, just as most trail advocates
petitioned to maximize the amount of land to be taken?

It appears to me that your biggest beef is that Breen
beat you at your own game. My complaint, as one who
values the Appalachian Trail just as highly as you, is
that it should never have been brought to the table in
the first place. It should never have been delivered
to the political card sharps, of whom Breen is one.

[...]

> Your last sentence reveals how little you understand 
> about the AT. The AT is more than just a thin corridor. The
> many people reached by 'Walk In The Woods' begins to hint at
> it. What do I mean by that? I mean that the AT was supposed 
> to be held dear in the consciousness of Americans. Your wording 
> doesn't come close to touching on that. I can tell you one 
> thing the AT isn't supposed to be,  -that is, grinding ski 
> machinery built up to the brink of a former AT sweet spot in
> Maine and one of its highlights...

Then where's the outrage over Wildcat?

>> Don't try to dignify the acquisition of Saddleback by
>> calling it a trade. Trade is not coerced.

> ~~~  And nature preservation as a concept is not dealt 
> with or seen in these primitive terms. 

So, in that case coercion is...what? Sophisticated?
Civilized? Progressive?

> Again, are you leaving the future of the AT up to a man
> who submits a false speculation and doesn't give a rat's
> ass about the AT? What is your suggestion for preserving
> the AT on Saddleback then? Is anybody who desires allowed
> to propose a threat to the AT on their terms and then label
> the AT's trying to preserve itself as "coercion". 

The Appalachian Trail was created on private property
by an unprecedented accomplishment of goodwill and consent
between land owners and trail advocates (something you
obviously don't appreciate or value), only to have that
trust shattered when the latter demanded that the trail
corridor be taken by government fiat. Now many of these
same people want land seen from the trail taken (or 
activities on them dictated) by similar means. It is
not the land owners who are making appeals to government
force.

>> Really now, why do you care? It's not like it was *your* money
>> or anything. Besides, what are "greasy bucks" to you compared
>> to an undeveloped Saddleback? Are you saying that all that
>> talk about the preciousness of the mountain was just so much
>> horseschumer?

>  ~~~ You're kidding (aren't you)? Intelligent people who care
> about the AT know why that is important. This precedence will
> make it difficult to acquire buffer zones in the future.

No shit. That's what I've been saying for years now.

[...]
 
>> Look, I don't think much of the Breens. I suspect that many
>> of his supporters on the property rights side of things don't
>> either. His use of political pull to take advantage of the
>> government's deep pockets showed that he wasn't resisting on
>> principle, but rather was playing the same game as the land
>> grabbers. It's certainly not how I would've played the hand
>> were I in Breen's position.

> ~~~  The purpose of the AT is to preclude the result we are
> seeing here on Saddleback and preserve a rural environment 
> for *all* Americans.

> I guarantee you, with things the way they are, those areas 
> will be self-rewarding once they are preserved! You are only
> falling short of the necessary end result in your analysis...

You deceive yourself by presuming to speak for others.
It is neither "self-rewarding" nor in the interest of
"all Americans" that the Appalachian Trail corridor be
preserved. In fact, most of them couldn't care less about
it. The sooner you recognize this, the sooner you'll be
able to deal honestly with your motives and understand
the short-sightedness of placing the trail's destiny 
in the hands of democratic government. 

Just because the state gets involved in something doesn't
magically make it "the will of the people" any more than
its acts are for "the public good." Even if such claims
were true, you're then faced with the prospect that what
government gives as an expression of popular will can
also take away at the turn of an election cycle. The 
Appalachian Trail is no longer being preserved by right,
but at the whim of the voting public.

[...]

>>> How this comes down to us inciting the locals is beyond me
>>> considering the circumstances we face now.
 
>> The locals aren't fools. They saw what was happening and 
>> realized that if Breen's property rights could be trampled
>> in the name of protecting a footpath and its viewshed, then
>> anyone's can. I know you believe it's irrelevant, but trail
>> advocacy is earning itself a bad reputation in my neck of
>> the woods. This is why the IAT in Maine is a road walk on
>> public rights of way, while the ITS is allowed to pass
>> through privately owned backcountry. A full Monty view of
>> wind turbines from Saddleback may be another consequence.

> ~~~ First, the AT is a defined and recognized corridor 
> with a specific cause. Saying everybody's land rights were
> threatened is Wise-Use horsedoo. 

They are threatened by the favored means of trail and
viewshed acquisition, not by the existence of trail itself.
Using viewshed preservation as justification for government
takings lowers the standard for everyone (though arguably
not as low as the current trend of using eminent domain
for urban commercial renewal).

Ends...Means...Learn to distinguish the two sometime.

> Read the locals words in the NPS review. Those people
> were flat out brainwashed by both Breen and political
> manipulators who convinced them AT radicals were coming
> to take their families. From the words I read, I would 
> say you were being generous with their motivations. 
> Myself, I think they fell for pie in the sky money promises
> and got the fever in tight times. Breen, in the meantime,
> promised them a cut of his huge take but then turned 
> around and put the hill up for sale. Are you seeing 
> the picture here? "The locals aren't fools"??? 

> What is happening is the people who are putting the
> *real* screws on the locals have succeeded in convincing
> them that preserving a national scenic trail is going
> to lead them to ruin... 

Had you waged your battle with private dollars, the locals
would've had *nothing* to say in the matter. It was those
who put the trail's protection in the hands of government
that gave power to their voice, and because of that you've
no right to complain about the locals being more convinced
by Breen's arguments.
 
>>> If anything your points validate a need to have taken harder
>>> action (which is what TP was saying btw...)
 
>> Like what?

> ~~~  Better Trail website participation for a desired goal. 
> There's a time to ditch the bad feelings and egos and get 
> together for the Trail's sake. Saddleback should not have 
> been sacrificed. By doing so the long-term AT outcome was 
> compromised, not improved. We should have gone to the 
> trenches and maybe Breen's ploy would have backfired. 

So you suggest the same thing, only more so. Keep that
up and you'll be embalming a corpse rather than preserving
a vision.

-TXIIS