Author: Holden Corey Stein

What is particularly fascinating about our current urban situation is that we, as a city, understand that we contribute heavily to air and sound pollution yet we are also aware of green roof technology and all of the health and societal benefits that come along with it. Green roofs, while being cool to spend time on or look at, provide several quantifiable and intangible benefits to our living space. The big concern is that if our city known for its affluence and liberalism, why don’t even a substantial portion of New York City rooftops have grass or other plants on them?

New York City was founded and developed very closely to a group of values that still define our city today. One value that the city maintains that also allows it to prosper amongst other global cities is its pragmatism. This city has always done things for money, results, and efficiency – artistic and environmental value come second. Our initial questions are not if we can make something look nicer or offer more plaza space – they are more along the lines of how much rent will a studio apartment cost per square foot or what is the quickest way to get to the Financial District? These types of priorities have shaped our city into the extremely practical municipality it is today. What is interesting to see, however, is that this pragmatism that has brought the city so far may actually have entrenched New York into inefficient designs and methods.

Naturally, it is going to take one or many reasons to change. The cause for green roofs is growing and the reasons for it are mounting. New Yorkers are still as concerned with monetary factors, as they should be. However, new factors such as living with better air quality and sleeping better at night have become more important to the average New Yorker’s living experience. No longer are New Yorkers willing to compromise their living experience for cheap apartments – a new standard is forming and green roofs are going to be an instrumental part in fulfilling those standards.

There is no question that humans have inexplicably changed the landscape. The chapter opens with a contrasting image – the perceived splendor and awe of the Manhattan skyline that many revel – put in the background as the nature of the Jamaica Basin lies peaceful in the foreground. The chapter reveals a history of continuous struggle that humans face when it comes to buying time for their destructive behavior and practices. The author writes pages about different laws and acts that have been passed while not neglecting to note that these laws only marginally impact corporate and environmental behavior. Society, while acknowledging our presence and impact, can only write into effect so many statutes or coordinate so many efforts.

People will tend to want to maintain their way of life, sometimes by even unethical and impractical circumstances. Garbage piles up more and more, yet it seems to just get shifted from place overtime. As New York grows into a model world city with affluent periphery suburbs, garbage and industry must be displaced more and more. From inner city or underdeveloped NYC neighborhoods, to the Meadowlands, to water barges taking our garbage across states, our city keeps putting bandaids on the problems.

I understand the effects of our development and industry on our environment and country’s biodiversity may be irreparable. I also understand that at this point our own health and development are at risk here. As we stratify ourselves into different neighborhoods and different classes, our neighborhoods will adjust to our public service needs differently. While multi-million dollar apartments continue to be a trendy living and investment option for few, many working class New Yorkers have a history of getting stuck with the garbage. Many Brooklyn areas like Gowanus or Coney Island were mentioned in the reading for having slimy creeks with poor conditions for human growth. If this is our future, where most people get stuck with their own wastes and chemicals, and only a lucky few get to live away from the mess we created, there may be more at stake than bird or fish species. Our own lives are at stake now, and it will take more than displacement and marginal statutes to solve our environmental crisis.

Even though it took quick work and only a relatively short amount of time, the environmental destruction that has been caused by human development is going to need much more effort to be countered or reversed. One solution the author poses in City at the Water’s Edge is that farmers establish new habits in efforts to preserve their local ecosystems and wildlife. The author suggested practices including: adjusting mowing cycles, utilizing local-based fertilizers, and saving immense expanses for local wildlife development (McCully 107). Although these suggestions may be practical and beneficial to the environment, farmers are being asked to completely adjust their normal agricultural practices, not to mention at a rapid pace. Even though the change would be extremely beneficial to the environment, I remain pessimistic that farmers who are dependent on output and government subsidies will sacrifice their land and profits to support wildlife they may consider a nuisance. In other words, unless gradual change or subsidies are implemented, a substantial culture shift amongst farmers would need to take place for them to selflessly adjust their ways.

In addition to commenting about farmers, I also felt that the way we target our ecosystem reconstruction is also peculiar. The author chooses to write about how weeds have been antagonized by American farmers and residents alike. McCully ironically pointed out that weeds actually grew more preeminent due to grazing practices. In addition, weeds were sought out for because of their nutritious and healing values before European farmers had extensively developed the Americas.

I am establish this point about weeds specifically to show how hypocritical Americans’ approaches are to protecting the environment. An interesting behavior to observe is how suburban families may donate to environmental charities, take shorter showers, or insulate their homes, but how they also use anti-weed products to exterminate weeds that may blemish their lawns. It is interesting to see how our perception of weeds being bad or out of place is still as alive as ever, even in a time when there is heightened environmental awareness and conservation efforts. An ecosystem is an ecosystem – utilities such as power, water, and garbage need to be reduced to protect from exacerbated environmental harm. Weeds are also part of the ecosystem – to grow a decorative tree and kill off local weeds is not protecting or promoting it; it is still environmental manipulation.

After reading Chapter 9, I couldn’t help but think of the dichotomy that humans have concerning bird conservation and appreciation. In one frame, humankind has an undeniable reverence to birds and the resources they provide us. For example, the author cites how the American Indians who inhabited the region before colonists celebrated and cherished eagles, so much so that there was folklore connecting the two. The American Indians had an intangible commitment to birds, as they believed that they had to ask the Mother Eagle for permission to hunt her fellow eagles. This type of respect that the Natives had for nature is certainly unparalleled to our core values today.

Colonists, after displacing the Natives and claiming the New World as their own, inherited the land and passed down their values. Those values, however, were much different and did not leave much room for respecting the environment and other animals. In fact, this is made clear with the author’s note about how entire villages and towns in the New York area would congregate to shoot down thousands of pigeons for pure sport and entertainment. The colonists’ actions deviate entirely from previously held believes. Instead of cherishing the birds, colonists were instead using them for primarily sport and entertainment purposes.

Fast forward to the Information Age that we live in today, and we can  see that our values regarding the environment and conservation may be finding a center. We now realize, with a well-said line at the end of the chapter, that “What has been destroyed can never be created again” (McCully 145). We are now becoming more determined to preserve what have become rapidly endangered species. In addition, when books such as City at the Water’s Edge tell accounts of formerly existent species, they convey to the readers that if we don’t try to change our lifestyles and cultural habits, there may be a lot more to lose. There is now becoming a clearer message that there are consequences for our actions, in the short and long-term. As these consequences become more apparent, they encourage us to shift more toward the American Indian values and how they treasured and honored the resources and animals they reaped and how the environment is worth preserving.

New York City’s history is often looked through the lens of man made development; starting from our humble colonial beginnings in the early 1600s to our current status today. If I were to ask for a rendition of New York History, I would say with confidence that a reasonable person would trace back lineage through different waves of immigrants or architectural formations. The assigned reading, Biodiversity Assessment Handbook, provided an impressive and comprehensive report of the geological and ecological history of New York City. What was truly interesting about reading the report is to see how our city as we know it has only existed for a comparatively irrelevant amount of time. The nature of the island has been grown, sculpted, and reshaped over millions of years, only to be paved over with relevant ease to make way for millions of people and rampant urban development.

One of the two main thoughts that stuck with me after reading the article was how astounding it is to realize that the NYC region has changed over rapidly in an incredibly short amount of time. In the handbook, there was a picture of what a pre-colonial model of Manhattan would look like. What was noteworthy, other than the lack of buildings, ships, and people ,was that there were mostly forests and pristine water and marsh areas primed for aquatic life. Towards the end of the reading the author acknowledges current conservation efforts are starting to reshape the city once again. In other words, the city may have hit its peak in terms of human-related development. As we grow more aware of our environmental impacts, we may seek to reshape our city once more – this time into a more balanced ecosystem where animals and wildlife may flourish once more from where they were once dampened.

In addition to think about the future of the city’s development, I also thought about how the information in this handbook, if exposed to more people, could instill pride in our environment and make it a larger priority in our lives. Over the course of our country’s development, Americans have radically altered the landscape and exposed many once preeminent animals and flora to endangered levels. At this point in time people realize the urgency in maintaining whatever wildlife and “pure” nature that we have left. Handbooks like this can be provided in schools to children to teach them about their urban and suburban environments. In addition to learning history from a natural perspective, children could learn their local tree and animal species and how they contribute to their daily lives. While many people may not see the utility or benefit of one tree, bush, or bird, these types of handbooks can teach people that their local ecosystem can provide them with priceless goods and services such as: fresh water, mixed fruits, and cooler temperatures.

The root of disregard to our local environment and conservation could be found in the establishment of the original colonies. As was discussed in class briefly yesterday, colonists during the Age of Exploration (15-17th Centuries)  sailed the seas looking for various resources that Europeans had drained back in their home continent. Whether it was the search for: land to grow sugar or spices, mines to reap gold and silver, or trees to use for shipbuilding, colonists had come in the search of resources – as for them it resources translated into the promise for wealth. With these initial values in place, early Americans and their descendants shared and learned after these values. This in turn, created a society based upon consumerism where goods are made and then sold – only to buy more valuable and precious goods.

The colonial mindset and the evolution of modern consumerism plays the largest role in our relative indifference towards the environment. In the book, City on the Water’s Edge, it is made evident that Europeans and Americans alike have decimated forests without much regard and that progress has remained, for the most part, unchecked.

The book shows that it is not enough to be aware of the scope of our destructive practices. Society has been aware of their practices for hundreds of years, even going back to  16th Century England where oaks were reduced by a ratio of 18:1 in mere decades after a ephemeral boom in shipbuilding. A level above awareness is now needed. In the presence of unprecedented urgency that we face today, there needs to be a movement towards a culture shift: a new sentimentality toward the environment.

Our habits and incentives will not change without the emergence of a culture shift. In general, we value tend to internally value profit and materialism because those can benefit us in the short-term. Normally, when a decision transpires into a long-term benefit, or a benefit that cannot be directly reaped by the decision-maker, it tends to be a less appealing option. This is the critical part of creating a more harmonious coexistence with nature – moving past awareness and onto making decisions with more than ourselves in mind.

The report “Biodiversity conservation and the extinction of experience” by James Miller suggests that humans may be getting too far attached from their natural surroundings for their own good. The trend of urbanization has quickly wiped out urban biodiversity. Apart from the obvious environmental consequences, the destruction of natural life around us may also lead the destruction of a part of the human element.

Up until the Industrial Era (circa Post-1800), it is arguable that humans have developed an understanding and certain respect for their natural environment. Whether people used natural based medicines for cures, or farmers studied terrain or moon cycles, people managed to incorporate an understanding of the natural world into their lives. Our current society operates differently, as a majority of the world’s citizens now live in urban environments. This, in consequence, has created a new human experience that may incomplete without a significant natural element.

For example, indoor entertainment has taken a massive appeal with our current generation. The rise of the internet and modern gaming, along with the preeminence of television culture, has limited peoples’ interaction with the outdoor world. The rampant development of land has played a role as well, as natural lands have been paved over and altered, limiting the exposure people can have to nature.

It will be fascinating to see how a generation without much exposure to the natural world will develop in terms of character and social participants. The article argues that people detached from nature may develop apathy – which was made apparent by the high school students who could not bother to distinguish bird sounds or extinct mammals. A trend of apathy would be disastrous, as it can lead to even more destructive policies and actions by our society.

On the contrary, the destruction of the environment, combined with the unprecedented amount of awareness that we have today, may lead our generation to become more responsible and realize how precious the natural world is. There is still a chance that the people who grew up without much of a natural presence around them will realize the significance of it now that so much of it has been destroyed or altered around us. With current movements toward more environmentally friendly policies and products, that human element that may have been feared as lost, may still be within us after all.

New York City is one of the highlights of all of human civilization – embodied in multiple media consisting of diverse peoples, towering skyscrapers, and tasteful arts. NYC is also a representation of how skilled humans have become at altering the environment to favor their own development and well-being. The world’s species have shown us that it’s especially challenging to adapt to the environment, especially in tough conditions that may be uncharacteristically wet, dry, cold, or hot. What makes humans different is their keen ability to alter ability to suit their needs, not the other way around. Sanderson and Brown in their work Journal Article “Mannahatta: An Ecological First Look at the Manhattan Landscape Prior to Henry Hudson” make it apparent that alterations to the island’s landscape have been drastic and in the making for hundreds of years.

It was surprising to read that landscape manipulation actually started with the American Indians, albeit on a smaller scale. American Indians developed a technique of clearing forest lands by setting off periodic fires that kept forestation at bay and maintained large meadow expanses (Brown & Sanderson 14). Colonists and their descendants surely accelerating landscape altering techniques by filling rivers, carving hills, or adding landfill. Modern property developers have certainly done their part as well – there are structures such as the Empire State and Chrysler to show for it.

As quickly and dramatic as damage to the environment has been done, there may be room to reshape the island from a more ecologically favorable perspective. In an era of especially heightened awareness concerning the effects of our hyper-consumption and urbanization, the tide for more ecological harmony may have already been set in motion. 400 hundred years ago, Manhattan may have existed as a pristine environment. 400 years from now, it may very well be the pinnacle and highlight of how humankind can coexist with the gifts of the natural landscape.