Escape to an Urban Wilderness Imagine walking along a wood chip path. The breeze is blowing against your face, and the sun is radiating through the treetops. The sounds of various birds and crickets chirping can be heard. As you come to the end of the path, a dock on a lake appears before you. Scanning your whereabouts, you see people fishing on the dock and catch a glimpse of a boat rental. In the glistening water, you notice children happily splashing in the water of the swimming area. You glance behind at the recreational center where individuals are sitting peacefully with cups of fresh coffee from the cafe inside. You are experiencing a quaint, little park nestled on the shores of Silver Lake called Silverwood. Silverwood Park is beneficial for …show more content…
Anthony/ New Brighton/ Columbia Heights area, Silverwood is exceptionally unique. Central Park, located in St. Anthony Village, has one path that circles around the park. It has a tiny playground, one pavilion, and a lot of fields for sports. Another park, called Driftwood, only has a playground, pond, and soccer field. There are also a few more surrounding parks that have small playgrounds with a plain, grassy area surrounding them. While these parks may be fun and have some opportunities, they lack the size and variety that Silverwood possesses. None of them can host a wedding and banquet, on the opposite side of the park, at the same time. These parks either have small bodies of water in them or none at all. Also, many parks are located nearby a main road making it loud and noisy. Silverwood is different because the recreational facilities and places to relax are located away from the road. There is a small, winding path for cars that travels from the entrance into the heart of the park. This, metaphorically, transports visitors away from the main road to a quiet, serene wilderness. Therefore, Silverwood is one of the most unique and lively parks in the Twin
From the prologue through chapter one in “Wilderness and the American Mind”, the author emphasizes the affect wilderness had on the Europeans during the colonization of America. In today’s society, we are familiar with the concept of wilderness but few of us have experienced the feeling of being encapsulated in the unfamiliar territory. Today we long for wilderness, crave it even. We use it as an outlet to escape the pace of life. However, we have a sense of safety that the Europeans did not. We are not isolated in the unfamiliar, help is usually a phone call away. Though we now view the wilderness as an oasis because we enter at our own terms, in the early colonial and national periods, the wilderness was an unknown environment that was viewed as evil and dangerous.
The whole island is in the shape of a giant square with white sandy beaches full of people sunbathing, swimming and fishing right on the shoreline. From the end of the hot pavement parking lot to shore of the beach is an ocean of soft white sand. The pearlescent white sand seems to know how to invade every nook and cranny almost as if it enjoys it. Walking around the beach on the fluffy whiteness surrounding the parking lot, the seagulls are fighting over scraps of food on the ground. “Sandy beach ecosystems provide invaluable services to humankind. Their functions have been exploited through history, with significant anthropogenic effects (Lucrezi, 2015)”. This white sandy beach is a beautiful refuge from the mundane grind of everyday life. The smell of the misty ocean air mixed with the sound of seagulls hovering above and kids playing is a tonic for the mind. The feel of the sand between their toes and the waves crashing over them as people swim in the water, or the jerk of a fishing pole when someone is catching a fish makes Fred Howard Park one of the best places to relax. Standing on the beach looking out on the water, people are kayaking and windsurfing. The lifeguards watching vigilantly in their bright red shirt and shorts, blowing their whistles when they see someone being unsafe. After a long day of swimming and laying around visitors head back over the soft white sand to the showers, in order to rinse off the menacing sand that clings to everything like a bad habit. Everyone rushes over the hot pavement burning their feet to reach their cars so they can put away their beach paraphernalia which is still covered in the white sand, nearly impossible to completely leave behind, so when they get home it serves as a reminder of where they were that
Max Oelschlaeger is an American ecological philosopher and works with the Center for Environmental Philosophy at the University of North Texas. Besides The Idea of Wilderness, Caring for Creation and The Environmental Imperative are two of his other books. The Idea of Wilderness won the Texas Institute of Letters’ 1991 Carr P. Collins Award and the 1998 San Antonio Conservation Society award. Oelschlager argues that the change of the idea of nature to the idea of wilderness has changed through the writings of environmentalist, scientist and that religion has played a huge impact on how we view and understand our relationship to nature. He hopes that humans realize their relationship with nature and learns to appreciate what nature has to offer. Oelschlaeger uses more archaeology evidence and reports and other works written by environmentalist and theologists.
Riverbank, a large city, has a district with a huge problem. Grant’s Valley, although booming with business, is a quaint and historic part of Riverbank that the residents want to keep that way. The business aspect of Grant’s Valley has an ever growing need for more space for tourists to park and there is just too much traffic for the area to withstand. Riverbank’s historically quaint Grant’s Valley would benefit from the destruction of the unused junior-high on 35th and Princeton and the new construction of a one hundred space parking lot and a new park. This would attract more people and lessen the unattractive curb appeal of the parking lot in the residential area of Grant’s Valley that the residents want
Ever wonder why people have fears of height? People have been pondering this question for who knows how long, maybe since man was able to climb. The author John Tierney has a genuine way of looking at it. He even has an article about it called “Can a Playground Be Too Safe?” It explains that it has been scientifically proven that children who take healthy risks early in life are not as fearful as those who don't.Lake Stevens should build a risky playground because children can overcome fears.
Yosemite National Park, is a beautiful piece of nature it is a 195 mile nature getaway from the urban life that is lived San Francisco, CA and 315 miles away from the fast pace and overwhelming life that is lived in Los Angeles CA. This place is like no other in the beauty of its nature. The park is “747,956 acres, and is the home to hundreds of wildlife species and thousands of Yosemite plants” (U.S. Nat. Park Service). Yosemite is known for so many beautiful features, from its granite cliffs, waterfalls, clear streams, giant sequoia groves and biological diversity. And also for its two rivers which are the Tuolumne and Merced rivers. These rivers begin in the park and flow as far as west to the Central Valley.
The surroundings around Hayden Park are far from what most people would consider to be pleasant. From the picnic table where I conducted my Freeze-Frame in Hayden Park I could see a junk yard with hundreds of old cars, a cement plant with loud trucks driving around the noisy machines, and a used car lot with a lot of obnoxious advertising, most of which is in Spanish. There was also a fenced in trailer park and some miscellaneous ...
Over the next 160 years Central Park has seen many transformations. An early decline in the 1900’’s followed by a revitalization by Robert Moses
There is no better feeling in this world than to be outdoors with nature, especially when there are numerous activities to dabble in. Often times people take for granted the sentimental value that they can experience by simply walking through a park. God created the Earth to be beautiful and peaceful, and people need to keep it that way. I have always shared a love of the outdoors with my dad and my brother. We have gone on numerous camping, hiking, fishing, and star-gazing trips ever since I can remember. It was no surprise to me when my dad decided to buy a lake house on Hyco Lake, right outside of Roxboro. We got a really good deal on the house, so my dad decided that Hyco Lake was the perfect spot.
The conquering and development of natural land has in the past, been seen as a mark of human civilization. In the United States, our progress is often measured by growth and development, but should this be re-examined? There are many opinions on the subject of urban sprawl and its effects on wildlife, but one thing is for certain, we are expanding. From 1955 to 2005, urban and suburban areas grew by 300%, however, the population only increased by 75% over the same period (Ewing, Kostyack and Chen). According to NatureServe, a non-profit conservation organization, urban sprawl threatens one of every three endangered species in the United States. NatureServe’s analysis states, “rare and endangered species data shows that three-fifths (60 percent) of the nation’s rarest and most imperiled species are found within designated metropolitan areas, with the 35 fastest growing large metropolitan areas home to nearly one-third (29 percent) of these species. (Ewing, Kostyack and Chen) Nevertheless, other groups believe urban sprawl is beneficial to wildlife. The Landscape Analysis Lab at Sewanee: The University of the South in Tennessee argues that suburbs are doing more for the bird populations in Tennessee than the government supported tree plantations. Their data shows more diverse bird populations making suburbs their home. They find the housing developments more suitable since they are likely to have a wide variety of tree and plant species and other structures that provide diverse nesting opportunities, whereas the tree plantations usually only plant one type of tree (Miller). So, the debate continues, are humans encroaching on wildlife habitat and posing a risk to their survival, or do suburban environments with their lush lawns and...
On September 9th, 2017 at approximately 7 p.m., I went to Gracedale Public Park to carefully conduct my observation on the individuals, who were at the park and their specific activities in the one hour of time. When I got there, the weather was beautiful with soft winds, a clear sky and with some dim sunlight. The park was full of people of all ages. Though, there were more kids than adults and some teenagers. There were many bicycles and strollers parked beside the tree I sat under. After a couple of minutes, the park filled up with more and more individuals and everyone seemed busy doing their own actions.
Examine the ways in which the unique indigenous lifestyles found in wilderness areas are under threat. A significant proportion of the world’s population – about 300 million people – are described as indigenous, or native, peoples. They belong to a rich and diverse array of cultures spread across the globe. Indigenous peoples are defined as the descendents of those people who inhabited an area before it was colonised by Europeans, or before a modern state was established there. Where groups of indigenous peoples have survived it is often because they live in extreme geographic and climatic conditions – very wet or cold, extremely hot or dry.
Walking through the woods never fails to clear my mind. After spending all day sitting in a stale classroom, filled with stress, confusion, and overwhelming responsibilities, taking a long stroll through the familiar woods behind my grandmother’s house lifts any worries that could ever weigh me down. I never wander through aimlessly. I always follow the trail of grass that has been deliberately cut down shorter than the rest, making it easier to tread through to the small creek at the end of the trail. The entire journey through the woods behind my grandmother’s house, there and back, first took on a whole new importance in my life during my junior year of high school.
It’s a beautiful morning, as my group of friends and I wake up, we hear the pounding and the thrashing of the water slamming on the moss covered granite rock, I go down the eroded leaf covered pathway to fetch water just like I would do every morning, the sun had just begun to rise, the mixture of scarlet red, orange, and a bleach-like yellow beaming against the hurried water of the river that led into the waterfall shone like flakes of gold floating on top of the whitening water. The serene environment of the surrounding rocks overlooking the waterfall, the ambience of water clashing against the granite, and the aroma of the white pine filling the forest is an awe inspiring experience to all who dare make their way down the narrow and lengthy
Outdoor recreation is something that everyone needs. Finding that place within yourself that allows you to forget about everything. Whether that be playing with your kids in the nearby park, fishing with your grandfather, hiking with someone or just by yourself you learn something new about yourself. Some people use recreation to forget about something and they use being outside as a calming effect. Williams and Stewart (1998) believe that nature, as a place, creates an emotion bond, has a complex meaning to the person, and that people have this draw back to the place. To get the same feeling that someone would get while doing an activity in nature to simulate Williams and Stewart’s (1998) belief, I recently participated in an