Phil Brown: Wilderness as a State of Mind
by Phil Brown
The state Department of Environmental Conservation’s proposal to remove fire towers from St. Regis and Hurricane Mountains raises some difficult philosophical questions, starting with: what is wilderness?
In calling for the towers’ removal, DEC relies on the definition in the Adirondack Park State Land Master Plan, which is taken from the federal Wilderness Act: “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man—where man himself is a visitor who does not remain.”
Fire towers are excluded from the State Land Master Plan’s list of acceptable structures in a Wilderness Area.
Actually, St. Regis and Hurricane Mountains are not in Wilderness Areas. The first lies in the St. Regis Canoe Area; the second, in the Hurricane Mountain Primitive Area. Nevertheless, both tracts are managed essentially as Wilderness, so the same prohibition applies.
The towers’ fans wonder why it’s OK to have ranger cabins, lean-tos, signposts, wooden bridges, stone steps, and trails in the wilderness but not fire towers. They view the towers not as an affront to wilderness, but as a symbol of wilderness.
Obviously, wilderness is in the eye of the beholder. The debate over the towers is about aesthetics and human sensibilities. Surely, fire towers have little, if any, impact on the ecosystem.
Some people say it’s impossible to find true wilderness in the Adirondacks. Wherever you go in this 5.8-million-acre Park, you’re never far from roads and, all too often, the noise of traffic. This is another way of saying you’re never that far from civilization.
But if distance from civilization is a hallmark of wilderness, then why not take this idea further and leave behind trails, lean-tos, signs, and the rest of our forest infrastructure?
Bushwhacking comes closer to wilderness as experienced by our forefathers, but in truth it’s still far from the same. When our ancestors went into the woods, they didn’t bring cell phones, GPS instruments, personal locater beacons, or even, in many cases, good maps and compasses. If they had an accident, chances are that no one would come to their rescue for days, if ever. Chances are no one else knew exactly where they were.
In short, they put themselves at far more risk than we do. I’ve often thought that to approximate the experience of yore, which is closer to true wilderness, you’d need to, at a minimum: (1) travel off trail, (2) leave behind the electronic devices that tether you to civilization, and (3) not tell anyone where you’re going.
Of course, this goes against the advice you’ll hear from forest rangers, wilderness professionals, and sane people generally, but I’m not saying you should do these things. My point is that wilderness is partly a state of mind. That’s why it’s so hard to define.
Photo by Phil Brown: the Hurricane tower.
17 Comments:
Good article. I can't say I totally agree, but the argument about bridges and lean-tos does hold water only to a certain extent.
I think the idea of lean-to's as well as designated camping sites is to concentrate impact. Ideally dispersion of impact has the lowest impact, but the reality is you would have a campsite every flat spot along the trail if they didn't concentrate impact.
On the flip side, if you eliminated trails, you might reduce impact, but look at the heard paths for an example of how that goes. Sure no official trail, which means no rock steps, water bars, drainage ditches, etc. The result is deeper human impact than a trail itself.
So trails enable the masses to generate impact, but they also concentrate it like lean-to's, bridges, and campsites.
The fire towers don't really do anything to improve the wilderness experience (which as you noted is largely a mindset), and they really don't reduce impact to the landscape. They are no longer used, and no longer have a current purpose. Bridges and ranger cabins still have a purpose, they are used in the management of the wilderness, which is a core responsibility of the NYS-DEC.
The sole purpose of keeping the fire towers is in my mind historical significance. However, we have enough fire towers outside of wilderness and primitive areas to illustrate the history of fire prevention in the Adirondacks (and Catskills).
So the question is beyond historical significance what purpose do the fire towers serve?
Phil,
I never use any of those stupid devices and I almost never follow a trail.
All I need is a compass, fishing rod (or rifle) and a warm jacket and I am fine for some time.
This behavior is a product of my youth. It's what we did for fun in the middle of nowhere. We called it taking a walk, aka getting away from the parents to do something stupid in the woods.
Maybe the "rednecks" like myself have a better grasp on the Wilderness experience than most.
Justin, you make a good distinction between useful infrastructure and non-useful. But many of the "useful" amenities serve mainly to domesticate the wilderness. Fording a stream is more of a wilderness experience than crossing on a bridge. Sleeping in a tent is more of a wilderness experience than sleeping in a lean-to. I'm not arguing we should do away with these amenities, at least not everywhere, but they do raise questions about the nature of wilderness. Is "managed wilderness" an oxymoron? As to the towers ... the advocates say the towers serve a purpose in educating the public about the Forest Preserve and its history. So your distinction is not as clear cut as it first appears. We're back to square one: what is acceptable in wilderness? And there is a whole spectrum of views.
Jon, glad you enjoy the wilderness in its pure state. I hope this doesn't make you some kind of elitist.
Our efforts to thwart the forces of entropy will ultimately be futile, but that doesn't mean we can't try.
While the Adirondacks may not rise to the philosophically pure version of "Wilderness", chances of having that moment with nature are greater here than in NYC. Those experiences can then be carried with the individual forever, and hopefully make it easier to appreciate every moment when a "wilderness" state-of-mind may appear.
Just leave the towers where they are. Don't maintain them and they will eventually be gone. It will take a long time but they will go eventually. People are mostly concerned with their own "aesthetic" experience in the short term. Wilderness doesn’t run on our clock. Some people just can’t wait. If people really want a wilderness then leave it alone. Personally I think you will find the closest thing to true wilderness on the larger tracts of private land within the Adirondacks. Even some of the most remote places will eventually get all tracked up like we see in areas that used to be "remote" like the High Peaks. To the supporters of spending the money and time to remove the fire towers a question: Should we bulldoze Mesa Verde so you don’t have to wait for those cliff dwellings to crumble? This is a sully debate.
Trying to apply the definition of wilderness as “an area where the earth and its community of life are untrammeled by man—where man himself is a visitor who does not remain” - to a place as popular and well used as the Adirondacks is insane.
The mere presence of hikers and paddlers necessarily diminishes the wilderness, even if every single visitor religiously practices Leave No Trace principles. If the DEC is serious about promoting "wilderness" the first thing they need to do is start limiting access - close the road to Lake Lila (an absolute zoo during the summer), start closing trails, except in places where they concentrate traffic more than they facilitate it, etc, etc.
But of course all of that would be ridiculous. This is state land, much of which is thoroughly trammelled, historically and currently with our actions, and I think in most circumstances access trumps trying to halfheartedly approach some ridiculous ideal.
If the fire towers are a hazard, are costly to maintain, or if there's some sort of sensible reason to take them down, the DEC should take them down. But it would be a tragedy if they were destroyed solely in an effort to cleanse the fictional "Adirondack wilderness" to placate a few people with a bad case of bureaucratic myopia.
Phil pin-points one of the central disconnects between the reality and the concept of "wilderness," that actually goes deeper into the illusion of a human/nature separation. Start thinking about that and it makes you look at the contemporary Adirondack reality somewhat differently, more deeply I would say.
I have always been opposed to the wilderness designations. Public lands are owned by the public, and should be used by the public. Closing off public lands, or making their use incredibly restrictive is not good policy for anyone.
Land use should be decided on a case by case basis, based on aesthetics and environmental impact. Most of the Adirondacks are far from pristine, many of the lands have been previously logged or farmed. Even so-called wilderness tracts have the remains of old woods roads in them, to say nothing of the popular hiking trails.
I don't see any problem with maintaining existing facilities on state lands. I also don't understand why in places that have been previously logged or had roads open, can't continue to be as used as in the past -- after considering the impact of maintaining such structures on steep slopes and erosion.
Andyarthur, you make some good points and I agree in general. One point you bring up is the question of whether land must have never been "disturbed" ("old growth") to ever be considered wilderness? Personally, I think previously disturbed land can be considered wilderness at a later time. I also agree that there are many access issues with much of the Adirondack public lands. Much of that consolidates users in small areas and has negative environmental impacts.
I also think the state goes a little overboard with all this "classification" stuff. It doesn't seem to matter much to them anyway. The DEC commissioner recently told a local environmental group in a letter that in the case of Lowes Lake they would manage the Primitive portions as Wilderness anyway. Since it doesn’t even matter to the department, why do they waste so much time and money on the process. All it does is polarize the different factions inside and outside the park. I am curious, why do they need these "public input forums"? If the thing is non-conforming why can't they just tear it down?
What is actually funny is that Phil Brown edited Bob Marshall's adventures in the Adirondacks and within those excerpts Marshall talks about the logging and development and such that was occurring in regions today that are undeveloped (lightly managed) wilderness (Five Ponds/Cranberry Lake region for instance). In another generation that wilderness will be even more wild again.
So my issue is do we say, "well we touched that land, it's dirty, ruined by human influence, lets just build a Walmart there."
The fact is there is very little land in this world left untouched by humans, and further very little land that cannot be accessed with the ease of a GPS, sat phone, and helicopter; yet if the human race was wiped off the earth tomorrow, it would only take hundreds of years for nature to reclaim most of our grand works. Have you ever noticed how much work it takes to keep your house from falling down? How about bridges, tunnels, roads? We fight a battle with nature and time that we cannot win. Yet some of us claim that we are winning!
What NY State has done, and admirably so, is take land it deems can be returned to as natural a state as possible, and lets that happen. Is it a perfect system? No. Ideally New York would be the last outpost of human exploration, and we'd have millions of acres that we could term true wilderness. Unfortunately we got started a few hundred years too late, and that opportunity is long gone.
But here is a great example. I loved hiking, bushwhacking and backpacking in the Upper Buffalo Wilderness in Arkansas (home of our first and only National River, a place that without the battles of Neil Compton would be Lake Buffalo or something equally terrible). The beauty of the upper Buffalo was it was fairly rugged land, but every now and then I'd find an old homestead within the confines of the wilderness. I'd also occasionally find an old wagon road. Most times it could have passed it without notice, others there was just a chimney left that now served as a campsite. What do you know, it was another "false wilderness" that had already been marred by mans evil hand. Yet, I still garnered tremendous enjoyment from my explorations.
I currently don't have kids, but we probably will one day, and they will probably have kids one day too. When those kids are in their 30s it will be 50-60 years from now possibly, and the Adirondacks CAN be wilder at that point then they are now. Or we can just toss in the towel and say, screw it, "once Colvin clear cut those summits the damage was done, lets build em up, we'll save the real wilderness somewhere else." And then future generations of New Yorkers WON'T even have a glimpse of what wilderness can be or even was!
I actually like the fire towers, but they do serve no purpose in todays world, and quite frankly are a hazard. Hurricane frequently has people scaling it's rusted skeleton, St. Regis has glass from the cab all over the summit.
Phil commented that they are educational, and I also noted that in my original response. However, I noted that there are plenty of educational fire towers that are not in wilderness or primitive areas. Is the Hurricane tower more educational than the Arab Mountain tower? How about St Regis vs the Overlook tower in the Catskills, or Hadley in the Adirondacks?
In my opinion the battle for these two towers is really not about the towers at all, but one side proving wilderness doesn't really exist, and the other fighting for the idea it does.
"it would only take hundreds of years for nature to reclaim most of our grand works." AND "Unfortunately we got started a few hundred years too late, and that opportunity is long gone." Justin, these two statements stand in stark opposition to each other? Which is it? Reclaimable? OR Long Gone? Many environmentalists like to use both arguments, each when it suits their purpose at the time. How can you have it both ways?
Justin, I like your observations. I want to clarify that the purpose of my post was not to argue for or against the towers. I was using the debate over the towers to raise a broader question about the nature of wilderness. People often focus on signs of man--old roads, cabins, towers, etc.--as antithetical to wilderness. But as you point out we can find signs of man just about anywhere, especially in the Adirondacks. Does this mean we have NO wilderness? Or is our definition of wilderness unrealistic?
As I hinted at toward the end of the post, considerations other than the presence or absence of signs of man may be just as important, if not more so, in evaluating the quality of a wilderness experience. Are you truly removed from civilization or are you just out for a walk in the woods?
You mentioned my Marshall book. There is a short chapter (p. 187) in which he proposes zoning the Forest Preserve. You'd have sections where there are lots of trails and amenities, sections where there are few trails, and sections where there are no trails. Essentially, this is what the state has done. This approach recognizes that there degrees of wilderness.
I absolutely agree that areas abused by humans can recover and become wild again. Marshall disliked the view from Rocky Peak Ridge, because he looked over a burned landscape. Today, Tony Goodwin extols the hike up Rocky Peak Ridge from New Russia as perhaps the best in the High Peaks.
Perhaps it will be even better when you grandchildren climb it.
Great comments from everyone. Someone previously brought up the impact people have on trails, summits, campsites, etc. The fire tower mountains are becoming more and more popular, in part due to the ADK "Fire Tower Challenge", but perhaps also to the fact that some have been restored and provide an informational bonus when climbed. This could help redirect more hikers to these "easier" mountains rather than trying to tackle the High Peaks with inadequate equipment or a lack of experience. Removing the towers takes away some of what makes Hurricane and St. Regis "special" - and they'd be even more special if the towers were restored and they had an educational component run by volunteers from a friends group.
Paul,
Once you start breaking paragraphs down into the sentences you want to read, the sentence then loses it's context. Those two sentences were in vastly different paragraphs that both were explaining two different things, neither actually conflicted with the real world.
1) I said, that mans works decay, and nature eventually reclaims itself. (Q: true or untrue??)
2) I said, unfortunately there are very few areas of our planet that are true wilderness by definition of not being touched by man. This stands very true in the Adirondacks. (Q: True or untrue?)
Those two statements don't conflict. Nature does reclaim itself, but very few bits of our natural world are truly pristine and untouched by man. That was all the two paragraphs essentially said. Neither then conflicts since both can be true without the universe spinning off it's axis.
However, just because nature can and does reclaim itself doesn't mean we should be destructive to either true wilderness or reclaimed wild lands, nor does it mean that we should not aspire to have some areas of our planet not dominated by the works of man. If one of those places happens to be in New York, then so be it. I'm not under the belief that for some reason we aren't worthy of having such a place.
What if bears learned how to build fire towers? Should we tear those down? Aren't people from nature too? So we learned to build a few things. Big whoop. It's part of the natural record. Leave it.
I said, that mans works decay, and nature eventually reclaims itself. (Q: true or untrue??)
TRUE. This is proven all over the Adirondacks. The town of Adirondack is probably the most well known example.
I said, unfortunately there are very few areas of our planet that are true wilderness by definition of not being touched by man. This stands very true in the Adirondacks. (Q: True or untrue?)
UNTRUE. I would argue that there are none in the Adirondacks. It is perhaps true for other parts of the world, especially some arctic and antarctic areas. But I don’t think that any parts of the Adirondacks qualify as wilderness as defined by almost all sources.
I understand your point now and I did take you out of context, I apologize.
I see (and I am sure you have seen) evidence all over the Adirondacks of areas that were once very much developed and are now quite "wild". In my lifetime I have seen whole small “towns” almost decay to the point of them now being mostly empty meadows well on their way to becoming woods again. These areas were not long gone (my words).
Justin, I think that you and I agree on lots of different levels.
This short article sparked some great discussion.
I'm not sure if this figures in to a wilderness definition or not, but to me and my family, fire towers are FUN! I think anyone who feels they're too intrusive to their wilderness experience should either lighten up or choose one of the other 100's of peaks without them.
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