As energy companies reap billions from the region’s energy reserves, some Westerners question whether enough of the wealth is staying home
Communities
Posted inNovember 28, 2005: Gold from the Gas Fields
‘Sticking around’ for an alpine valley
From his kitchen window, Attilio Genasci can see past barns and alfalfa fields to a small knoll jutting up from the flat expanse of Sierra Valley. Angie, his wife of 50 years, is buried there. For Genasci, 96, the vista is a daily reminder of his promise to Angie to protect this spacious valley, 45 […]
Posted inNovember 28, 2005: Gold from the Gas Fields
Energy companies plow some profits back into Western ground
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Gold from the Gas Fields.” As he sat in his Houston office on Nov. 10, Raymond Plank, the chairman of Apache Corporation, tracked news reports about the Washington, D.C., hearing, in which members of the U.S. Senate scolded five of his fellow oil-company executives. […]
Posted inNovember 28, 2005: Gold from the Gas Fields
‘Death is stingless indeed and as beautiful as life’
I was over 80 when I found myself in a college classroom with 20-year-olds, wondering how to bridge the age gap and teach them something useful about the conservation movement in America and my role in it. I began by remarking that it must be hard for them to believe that I was once their […]
Posted inNovember 28, 2005: Gold from the Gas Fields
Heard around the West
NEVADA You’ve gotta love Oscar Goodman, the mayor of Las Vegas: He doesn’t hesitate to trumpet what he thinks, no matter how over the top. Appearing on a TV program in Carson City recently, the mayor sounded off on lawbreakers who spraypaint graffiti over freeways. “These punks come along and deface it,” he said, according […]
Posted inWotr
A Western railvolution begins
In 1981, when I got my first car — a used Toyota Corolla — the first thing I did was take a trip out West. For a prisoner of the sprawling suburbs of St. Louis, Mo., nothing could have been sweeter than to put that sea of homes in the rearview mirror, and to fill […]
Posted inWotr
Avian flu: Don’t fear the flocks yet
It’s November, which means that the snow geese are pouring into Oregon’s Klamath Basin in the hundreds of thousands. The sight of the undulating flocks, snow white against slate blue storm clouds, is unspeakably beautiful. These are tundra geese, passing through en route to winter quarters in California’s Central Valley. They have come all the […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Crossing hearts on Colorado’s plains
Laura Pritchett’s first novel, Sky Bridge, is set in “Nowhere, Colorado,” on the ranchland east of the plains town of Lamar. In this tiny place assaulted by big forces — climate change, the global economy, federal policies — teenage narrator Libby finds the prospects slim: “… all my old schoolmates are either doing drugs or […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Property-rights measure overturned
The property-rights movement’s latest star has fallen. On Oct. 14, a judge ruled that Oregon’s Measure 37, passed by voters last year, was unconstitutional. The measure allowed landowners who believed they’d lost property value due to land-use regulations to demand that state or local governments either pay compensation or waive those regulations (HCN, 6/13/05: So […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Commuter trains could connect the West’s far-flung cities
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Back On Track.” Even as light-rail lines promise to revolutionize transportation within the West’s metropolitan areas, longer commuter rails could connect these far-flung cities in ways they have not since railroad’s glory days a century ago. Unlike light rail, which uses overhead electrical lines, […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Reading, riding and relaxing
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Back On Track.” Kevin Koernig believes light rail is making him healthy, wealthy and maybe even wise — or at least well read. Koernig lives in Littleton, a suburb along Denver’s southwest light-rail line, and commutes by train several days a week to his […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
A city center in the suburbs
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Back On Track.” On weekdays, Charlie Lybrand’s car doesn’t budge from its parking space. A student of economics at Denver’s Metropolitan State College, Lybrand lives in an apartment complex in the suburb of Englewood. Just out the door is a light-rail station. “I use […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Light rail moves inland from the ‘Left Coast’
Note: This article is a sidebar to this issue’s feature story, “Back On Track.” On any given Sunday afternoon in Salt Lake City, Utah, families in their shirt-and-tie finest queue up at light-rail stations near the Mormon temple. On a Saturday night, fans of the Utah Jazz, the city’s professional basketball team, disembark for a […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
The day they close the pass
Old-timers still remember when winters in mountain towns meant something more than just catering to hordes of skiers. Sure, those winters were tough; the days were short and cold, and drifting snow restricted outdoor activities and even closed some businesses and high mountain roads. But mountain winters had a positive side, too, for they were […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Heard around the West
UTAH Eighty may be the new 60, but ski resorts aren’t thrilled by the increasing number of ancient customers who refuse to hang up their skis. So Park City, like many other ski resorts, has abandoned its ski-free policy for those over 70. Septuagenarians must now pay $249 for season passes, reports the Park Record. […]
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Back On Track
One of the West’s most sprawling, traffic-choked cities becomes a champion of mass transit — and a cleaner, greener future
Posted inNovember 14, 2005: Back On Track
Eastern Sierra counties seek sustainable growth
Land trades could help build affordable housing without compromising a beloved landscape
Posted inOctober 31, 2005: The Public Lands' Big Cash Crop
Odes to an urban mountain range
Like other mountain ranges that dominate city skylines, Albuquerque’s Sandia Mountains are too easily taken for granted. The Sandias’ diverse hiking trails range from the lung-busters that scale the west side’s granite face to lush trails on the east that meander through mixed conifers. But how many of the city’s half-million residents take advantage of […]
Posted inOctober 31, 2005: The Public Lands' Big Cash Crop
A long walk into hope
This is a book by a tall skinny guy with a goofy warm smile who took “a long walk across America’s most hopeful landscape: Vermont’s Champlain Valley and New York’s Adirondacks.” Along the way, he meets up with old friends, many of whom also seem to be tall skinny guys with goofy warm smiles, who […]
Posted inWotr
Land trusts have gotten the word to shape up
Over the past several years, conservation easements have come under increasing scrutiny. Critics have argued that these private agreements — designed to forever protect open space on private land from development — have resulted in widespread abuses, such as giving too much money in tax breaks or other advantages to the wealthy and powerful. These […]