| VOLUME 31, NUMBER 4 | THURSDAY, September 16, 1999 |
Dear Editor:
Given the overwhelming student interest in the new Hadley Road apartments, it seems clear that students want apartment-style living on campus. Ground has now been broken for the next phase of student apartments at Lake LaSalle. The motive for these construction projects appears to be a sincere desire by UB officials to meet student needs. But this new student housing is coming at a price, not just in dollars. Consider the following:
If you ask students and their parents what they like about the appearance of a campus, they will not say "we liked that campus because it had so many new apartment buildings." But they will tell you they love campuses that look like campuses because they are wooded, park-like and embrace natural beauty.
The location chosen for the Lake LaSalle apartments is (or at least was) arguably the most beautiful natural spot on the North Campus. The loss of this place is tragic and has affected many of us profoundly. What sense does it make to eliminate an asset like this? No matter how attractively designed and nicely landscaped, the new apartments will not recreate this natural place or add beauty or serenity to the campus equal to what is now lost forever.
Unfortunately, UB North Campus is stark, sterile and (some would say) ugly. The campus desperately needs to be beautified and naturalized. What students and their parents now experience is a giant cement and brick spine surrounded by parking lots. The new flower beds are a step in the right direction, but the campus' stark image will not change for the better by surrounding the spine and its parking lots with apartment complexes and their parking lots.
The Lake LaSalle site might have been spared had UB decision-makers paid attention to the UB 2025 campus land-use plan that was developed by the university's Environmental Task Force (ETF) in 1995 and accepted by the UB administration in 1996. The decision-makers also neglected to consult with the ETF, an organization the administration has put "on hold" since Jan. 1 by refusing to appoint new leadership.
The campus does not belong to a few select campus decision-makers (no matter how smart or well-intentioned). The campus is public land and, as such, it belongs to all of us, including the general public. Thus, campus land-use decision-making should be open. Minimally, shouldn't there have been hearings and consensus-building before embarking on an aggressive, campus-development plan that may eventually result in as many as five student-housing developments?
It is ironic, as one colleague pointed out to me, that residents of East Aurora (or any community in New York) have more opportunity for democratic participation in decisions about whether a new Wal-Mart is built in their town than members of the UB community have in campus land-use decisions.
State law requires an environmental impact statement (EIS) when projects will have a substantial impact on the environment. The clearing of land for the Lake LaSalle apartments clearly had that kind of impact. Was an EIS done? If so, how did it address the loss of this natural area? If an EIS was not done, what was the rationale for not doing it? Was there a legal requirement? An EIS, incidentally, would have required public participation.
I work with many people who are involved with these housing projects and have even been invited to make suggestions about building design. These are fine people, conscientious, well-intended, all trying to do the best for the university and its student "customers." But I think something is amiss. This fast-track crash process is producing casualties, and selecting the Lake LaSalle site was a big mistake.
Earlier this summer, when I saw what was done by the earthmoving machines, I just stood there in silence and shock, not knowing whether to scream curses or simply cry. I ended up doing both, professional detachment not being an option. In my 17 years of employment with UB, I never felt so disappointed, betrayed and violated by this institution. I thought of all the hours I had spent in that place, feeling its peace and beauty. It was a little oasis, a refuge on this over-industrialized campus. The grief I feel about this loss is almost indescribable.
Cutting of trees for student housing "an absolute outrage"
To the Editor:
I, too, feel a tremendous sense of loss when trees or forests are destroyed. I think it's an absolute outrage that the lovely stand of trees was destroyed around Lake LaSalle to make room for more student apartments. I saw "before" and "after" pictures after that area was desecrated. It was enough to make me physically sick! The clear-cutting was apparently done without consulting any of our environmental groups or without an impact statement.
We all know the scientific reasons why plants and trees are so vital to our ecosystem-oxygenation of the air, root systems to prevent erosion, shelter and homes for various forms of wildlife, etc. But, for me, it is more of a feeling of what green spaces and trees and flowers do for my inner being.
I get a great sense of inter-connectedness and peace when I'm surrounded by nature. Believe me, parking lots and over-construction do not give me the same feelings!
Most people get a warmth or sense about their surroundings that may be hard to put into words. It just makes them feel good to be surrounded by nature. A campus that recognizes this would certainly attract more students.
I appreciate all the beautification that has been done to the North Campus, but I'm very troubled when such a beautiful area with mature trees is completely leveled. Even if more trees are planted, they won't have the size, shading or magnificence of those that were taken down. I'm sure I join many who also mourn the loss of yet another green space.
Triggle's utterances fair poorly against Gettysburg Address
To the Editor:
The Gettysburg Address, even as Van Gogh's paintings, took a long time to register: "It was not until many years later that the address became recognized as one of the classic utterances of all time." (Encyclopedia Britannica, 1950 Edition, Volume 14, plate II)
Many contemporaries fiercely criticized the "utterances," although Everett, the speaker preceding Lincoln at the occasion, commented in print, "I wish that I could flatter myself that I had come as near to the central idea of the occasion in two hours as you did in two minutes."
For those who believe that the provost's utterances are misjudged by contemporaries, only to be recognized for their brilliance by more distant and dispassionate observers, I submit in evidence the opening two sentences of both:
Lincoln: Four score and seven years ago, our fathers brought forth on this continent a new nation conceived in liberty and dedicated to the proposition that all men are created equal. Now we are engaged in a great civil war testing whether that nation, or any nation so conceived and so dedicated, can long endure. (2 more minutes)
Triggle: A recent review in the Economist described universities as one of our most ancient institutions, with an associated history of approximately 1,000 years. But universities are really much older than that, and can trace their origin to the library at Alexandria and to the Greek formalism of scientific inquiry. (2 more hours)
I rest my case.
Lake LaSalle student housing comes at an environmental price
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