But one of the loudest complaints about building denser in the urban core near certain areas, is that dense construction is a threat to wilderness and habitat *right there in the urban setting*. That in some way the wilderness and habitat in the urban boundary should prefer low density single family exclusive land use surrounding it.
I’m not sure why but this has become conventional wisdom, it is just so. It’s never challenged for factual basis. We can’t build new towers near the Mississippi Gorge at the Ford site ... because ... the National Park would suffer? It seems this is mostly an aesthetic argument.
This struck me again in this news story about Blaine restoring a wetland to its original plant ecosystem, removing invasive trees. Suburbs being built with the implied promise they are perfect as is from year one, the luxury home buyers were distressed the forest next to their back yards was getting cut down and returned to native wetland.
http://www.startribune.com/blaine-s-wet ... 480318003/
A home owner had this comment.
There is something to this. If wilderness or habitat won’t be surrounded anymore by rural land use or other wilderness, surrounding it with modern big home privacy fenced back yards or carhole-face front yard is a significant detriment to the visual appeal of the wilderness and habitat."I can't imagine they'll enjoy walking the pathway and looking over the grassland into the back of everybody's houses," said neighbor Donald Karas, a retired general contractor.
I’d argue that if you are a city and are going to build housing within the viewshed of wilderness or habitat, IMO, taller multifamily or commercial buildings next it is much more visually attractive and maybe even better for the health of the habitat. I’m a cat lover, but I have this suspicion that a street full of homeowners let cats run free outdoors than one apartment full of people would.
Anyway, Don’s comment got me thinking and I had a rant coming... Twitter wasn’t going to fit.