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  hen Thoreau
wrote the passage above, he and Ralph Waldo Emerson were the
leaders of a movement in literature referred to as "transcendentalism."
Not to be confused with "transcendental meditation"
(popularized by the Beatles in the 1960s), transcendentalism
was a philosophy that, among other things, closely examined man's
relationship with nature.
 The
"nature" aspect of transcendentalism was in large part
influenced by a renowned New York landscape artist named Thomas
Cole. Cole extensively wrote and lectured about his views that
progress must be tempered by careful and gradual development
of a nation's resources. "Subduing the wilderness,"
he wrote, "must not mean rampant destruction."
When traveling
through the New England area, one can't help but feel that these
transcendentalist ideals have had an influence on the unique
way the area has developed. For one thing, there appears to be
a much greater emphasis on one aspect of community design that
is often ignored in other parts of the country, the inclusion
of "natural open space."
In San Diego,
like most Southern California cities, natural open space is defined
as "what you want to do with the other guy's property."
In New England, however, it is often included as an integral
and important part of a project design. An autumn vacation in
Vermont or Connecticut would not be nearly as desirable if the
commercial villages, streets and home sites were not neatly tucked
between the trees.
Critics will
undoubtedly say "it's different in New England because they
have so many trees and Southern California is a dessert."
Randall Arendt, author of the influential Rural By Design
points out, however that individuals will always favor living
in communities with open space incorporated into the design,
even if it results in them having a smaller lot for their home.
Arendt points out that homeowner's "thirst for open space"
is evidenced by the fact that 40% of the owners of golf course
fairway homes don't even plan golf!
In San Diego,
one needs only look to the most desirable communities to see
the common denominator is a connection with nature. It could
be the eucalyptus and pepper trees of Rancho Santa Fe, or the
sandy shores of La Jolla. Even though developers have shown resistance
to preserving large portions of their projects due to endangered
species, it is now common to see newspaper adds for these same
developments showing only pictures of the required "natural
open space" rather than the homes themselves.
Linda Romero
of the State of California Urban Forestry Department testified
before the Carlsbad City Council last September about the benefits
of preserving and adding to woodlands in and around our cities.
She pointed to studies showing improved real estate values, reduced
automobile emission levels and other "quality of life"
issues. One study she cited even showed that patients heal faster
in hospital rooms that have views of wooded areas.
One fascinating
approach to incorporating open space in project design is the
tiny town of Lincoln, Massachusetts. Located just two miles from
the town of Concord (where Thoreau and Emerson lived and wrote),
Lincoln has been described by David Morine, a past director of
acquisition for the Nature Conservancy, as the best example of
community land-use planning in the United States. Much of the
credit for Lincoln's success can be given to Bob Lemire, a local
land planner and former Harvard Graduate School of Design instructor
who has made Lincoln his labor of love since the 1960s.
Lemire's formula
is simple, "Save what needs to be saved; build what needs
to be built." Through his enthusiasm and perseverance, Lemire
was able to convince city hall to "throw out conventional
zoning standards" and instead design around each site's
natural features. This has allowed the community to preserve
over 50% of the town's 9,500 acres in permanent and irreversible
open space and create more than 90 miles of riding and hiking
trails.
Although San
Diego has completed a master plan to preserve more than 200,000
acres of natural open space (the Multiple Species Conservation
Plan), virtually nothing has been done by local agencies to allow
flexible design criteria for developers to incorporate this master
plan into their projects. Unfortunately, our conservation efforts
have primarily focused on trying to buy most of the property
(which is not likely since it is estimated to cost in excess
of $2 billion).
Lemire has
said that his success in Lincoln is due to the fact that their
approach is on a project-by-project basis, accounting for each
landowner's land value expectation. "Without that consideration,"
Lemire says, "any plan will fail." Although some of
the open space in Lincoln has come from charitable donations
to conservancies, the vast majority of the open space was voluntarily
created on each development project. This could happen because
each landowner was given the leeway to design around the land's
predominant natural features.
The Lincoln
approach is definitely a "win-win" proposition and
one that could work in San Diego. All that is needed is willingness
for agencies to accept projects designed around a property's
natural attributes, rather than some arbitrary set of outdated
zoning regulations. 
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