Greening up your town---part one

      GREENING UP YOUR TOWN, PART #1

Over the next few weeks, I will examine various ways we can improve our quality of life in our towns.  I will focus on changes that will make our cities greener and in doing so, a more attractive place to live.  I believe we will conclude not only will our towns be more pleasing to the eye, but these changes can usher in a new wave of progress which will move them into the forefront of progressive communities.

First, let's list the most common of our warts.  You know, the eyesores we all gripe about.  Now, in doing this we must be brutally honest.  Trying to gloss over a disaster will get us nowhere.  Here is the first part of my list.

The seemingly endless maze of overhead utility wires.  I know we can't get rid of all of them, but surely we could try to mandate some of our major thoroughfares as underground utility areas.  Next, how about those vast sheets of asphalt without a blade of grass?  We call them parking lots.  Now if a blank acre or so of asphalt doesn't turn you off, multiply it by 100.  What about the signage?  Are we advertising to Godzilla?  A 100 foot tall sign on a city street?  And how about those sandwich signs with sheets of paper blowing in the wind or the flashing arrow boards on every corner? 

Now, let's talk about the view a visitor receives as he or she drives into our towns.  Would our visitors be impressed with their entry into most of our cities?  Not hardly!!!  No trees or shrubs;  a maze of utility wires;  signage that is oversized and just plain ugly.  Landscaping that seems to be done by a paving machine.  In fact, without a doubt, if a poll was taken to designate the ugliest place in your town, one of your entryways, would probably win.

Now before we continue our list, let's see if we can find any answers to this first wave of eyesores.  As we look for answers, I believe we can also solve some of our transportation problems.  We can design a plan that will help both our looks and our communities' travel needs.

First, our major entryways into town.  Most of our towns are bisected by two major thoroughfares, a major north-south street and a major east-west street.  These two streets have by far the largest traffic count in our cities.  They serve as the primary entryways for most people.  Visualize that impression.  It is usually a sad scene.  Let's see what we can do to improve it.

First, both streets will probably need construction work done to make them functional.

Unless your town is under 5,000 in population, your street improvements should start by making these streets four-lane.  In addition, most of our cross-town entryways fail to properly connect with the regional highway system.  Nothing will help a city more than for your major thoroughfares to connect as four-lane access to the regional highway grid.  But let's don't stop with just making street improvements.  Your street plans should designate these thoroughfares as underground utility areas.  Next, landscape the entire route on both streets with trees.  Place them 25 to 30 feet apart along both sides of the street.  From my experience, a sycamore is probably the best choice and the popular Bradford pear the worst choice.

Thinking back on my travels, I can still recall a city entryway with towering trees almost touching across the road.  No, it wasn't one of the great cities of Europe.  It was Benghazi, Libya, a 3rd rate city in a 3rd world country.  The Italians had occupied Libya in the 1920's, and they had lined the major entryways into town with Eucalyptus trees.  It's sad to say a miserable little town like Benghazi has a more attractive entrance than most of our towns.

If we make this initial move to beautify and improve these two streets, our towns will make a major step toward traffic improvements and beautification.

Next week, I will continue this discussion to cover signage, green spaces on parking lots, and several other topics.