Meet Doris

This week while running some errands, I noticed a rusty-fendered women’s bike with a duct-taped seat in front of a bank. Continuing my errand, I hoped to get that photo on the way back, but the woman was walking off with her bike when I got there. I chased her down, calling to her, asking her if I could indeed take her photo. 

So it turns out I had met her before. Her name is Doris, and she lives in my neighborhood. She had her yoga mat rolled up and stuck in the rear rack on her bike. 
Doris rides to her exercise class two or three times a week. She participated in the The Epic Spartanburg adventure film series; her adventure: crossing a major arterial road leaving her neighborhood to get to class.

Her son had found the bike, she told me, and she liked it better than any other bike she’d had. But it caused some funny stories. One time, she said, she was walking her bike across one of the must streets that bisect Spartanburg, when a man in a car came to a sudden stop, jumped out of his car to hand her a $20 bill.

“Here, take this.”

She stepped back from her bike. “I don’t need your money,” she told him. 

He insisted. “No, take it, buy yourself something.” Doris chuckled as she told the story.

He thought she was homeless, you see, because she was on her old bike. The yoga mat, she said, must look like a bedroll. She chuckled again.

Doris’s story brings up an important part of the culture we need to change here. If you ride a bicycle (especially a beat up one) or if you walk for transportation, you are suspect: too poor to own a car, to drunk to have a license. The examples of poor bike/ped infrastructure confirm the feeling of inferiority.

There is some piece of truth to the "too poor to own a car" view. Partners for Active Living runs a bike-lending program, fixing up donated bikes, lending them for three or six months for a $15 deposit, which is returned when you return the bike. The program has been very successful and moves about 350 bikes in and out regularly. 

PAL started the program to encourage more recreational cycling for exercise, but it turns out that about 40% of the borrowers have no other transportation. More than one person has come in to borrow a bike and told us that he needed it to get to his new job. One woman has been riding her bike to work for several years, and returns and re-borrows bikes several times a year. 

One man returned his bike early. When we asked why he was returning it, he pumped his fist, the excitement in his voice was palpable. “I bought a car.” 

You wouldn't walk here unless you
had no  other choice.

And, we say, these are excellent reasons to improve conditions for cycling and walking. Talk about economic development: this is real, on the ground economic growth. If only "buying a car" wasn't such a sign of prosperity.  

The mark of the sin of poverty is apparently found in our transportation choices. Doris lives in a nice house in a desired neighborhood, and owns a car. But on her bike, she looks homeless. She is less than us, and surely she wishes she could share in our petroleum fueled bounty.

As we work in Spartanburg to improve our bicycle and pedestrian facilities— and thereby improve our transportation system— perhaps it will feel more inclusive, and those of us who ride for transportation will be more visible, and Doris won’t be categorized by her choice of transportation.

Raceland, Kentucky asks Why not here?

I spoke by telephone with the Raceland, Kentucky Chief of Police Don Sammons the other day about the town’s and Greenup County’s work to create a bicycle culture in their case to spur economic development. 

The story has been well told in the local press (here and here) and Chief Sammons has presented at some conferences, he told me. And while he didn’t ask it the way I do, the drive for the Chief’s efforts came from looking for the answer to our question, “Why not here?”

Sammons told me that he started his work in 2012 because he loves history and wanted to preserve the history of Raceland, named for a race track built there in the 1920s. As he researched other communities’ economic development initiatives, he hit on bicycling, and a walking tour around town became a bicycle tour out to the racetrack 6 or so miles from town.

The old Raceland Race Track, built in 1924.

Sammons is not a cyclist, and so he looked around the area for experts. Hitting on the ACE Bicycling Club based in Ashland, Kentucky, the Chief set up a partnership that continues today. A Commonwealth of Kentucky program called “Trail Town” provided some parameters for being so designated, and 12 miles became 500 miles. Using routes the cyclists already ride, and looking for connections to the nearby Greenbo Lake State Park and other destinations around Greenup County by way of scenic and lightly travelled roads. They named their system the EK Bikeway.

These on-road routes, marked and mapped to attract out of town visitors, go along with Sammons’s other push—walking tours and community development. He tied the town’s commitment to sidewalk repair. Working with some local artisans, he approached owners of vacant buildings until one of them gave him free rent in return for the labor and capacity to improve the interior and set up shop. 

“I told them I had no money, but I do have workers,” he said. "Eventually one owner gave me a part of his building, and re-opened his tire shop to try to help push traffic." The complex has expanded to include a local authors shop, where local writers can sell their work in return for spending Saturdays in the store. 

Chief Sammons has convinced several of the other towns in Greenup County to join in, making changes in their own communities as they work to stir a faltering economy. He has convinced the town to change the speed limit in the downtown area to 15 miles per hour, and the signs read, “Watch for Our Children,” “Watch for Bicycles,” “Watch for Walkers.” He hopes to begin to attract businesses to the town, a bike shop, cafes, another bookstore. 

Chief Sammons also said, “I feel like I’m in over my head sometimes.” I suspect it is this very quality that makes him a visionary. He is willing to create the partnerships that fill the gaps in his own expertise, and by his leadership he has brought Raceland and the other towns along with him on their journey to renewed prosperity. The story, which of course continues, serves as an example for us all.

Trails: Good for you and good for business

Originally published in the Spartanburg Herald Journal:

As part of its Active Living Series, Upstate Forever convened a panel discussion on Feb. 6 in Spartanburg of a group of us involved with developing walking and biking trails. The room filled to capacity, with more than 75 people in attendance.

Follow the link to read the rest of the article.

Riding to work

I ride to work most every day. I don’t really like riding in the rain, and some days I have meetings that take me beyond my bicycling limits for workday travel. But any other day—and I've ridden when it’s over 100 degrees and when it’s below 10 degrees—I saddle up and pedal the two miles from my house to the office.

I’m fortunate that about half my ride is in my neighborhood, with calm streets and little traffic. That’s not to say drivers don’t occasionally forget that there may be someone else on the road and roll through an intersection. Crossing Pine Street is generally easier than I expect. (Here's a video I made of a little bit different commute.)

As I ride into downtown, I take back streets—St. Paul Street, which goes behind the Farmer’s Table, and Real Estate Way make my usual route; sometimes I take the road in front of the Y. From there I come in Kennedy Street, wide enough that all the traffic gets into the inside lane, leaving me with a 12-foot bike lane.

Most days, my ride is pretty causal. I often say hello to people walking on the sidewalk. I think about different things—my work day, the letter I started, what that thing was moving in the grass. I try not to get too warmed up, and have found that 10 miles an hour is the threshold for sweating in the summer. And though occasionally I think I’m too tired to ride, I always feel better when I do. The 15 minutes twice a day does my body and mind good.

Paths to goals

Recently I heard someone say, and I can’t remember where or who, that a community’s issues are generally not “goal” issues, but “path” issues. The idea has been stuck in my craw ever since.

Most of us want to live somewhere that has public spaces 

like this one, in the other Carmel (California).   

Being intimately involved in pushing forward some of our community goals, I have seen this perception as a kind of truism. We want an equitable and healthy community, a vibrant and profitable economy that benefits all citizens, citizens happy and engaged with access to a strong education at all levels, and to the arts, activities and good food. We want a community whose residents love living here, and we want to be governed by thoughtful people full of integrity who respond to the needs of the community. The arguments we have in our community mostly result not always from competing goals, but from differing views about the paths we choose. 

One thing is certain: investing in walkable downtowns, bike and walk-friendly neighborhoods and commercial areas and good land use policy that supports it all. I recently saw James Brainard, mayor of Carmel, Indiana, speak about their experience.

Carmel has been in the community-development news for a while, and I can’t pretend to any great scoops about how they did it. But a few things he said in his talk really struck me as something that is possible in small cities and towns everywhere. I would say all of that starts with commitment and policy. 

Proceeding from the belief that design governs all matters, Carmel developed a set of design standards intended to create the old town feeling they sought. The overlay ordinance, Brainard said, makes it so “you can't tell if a house was built in 1910 or 2012.” Streets designed for traffic calming (1 1/2 to 2% of Carmel’s budget is for street trees, Brainard said) make active transportation comfortable and easy. Requirements for second floor (at least) residential space above retail stores in the downtown core and underground parking (paid for with tax increment financing) make for a human-scale downtown. Eighty-five roundabouts in the city give it an efficient, safe system for vehicles, and walking and biking are included in the designs, it appears.

I should add first that Mayor Brainard’s presentation left me wondering where the battles were. Especially when he (maybe) glossed over the details of a $95 million DOT swap to create an arterial under passing a spectacular double-roundabout intersection.

The Indiana Department of Transportation wanted to 

put up traffic lights to solve this problem 

caused by Carmel's rapid growth. The city taking over 

ownership of the intersection (at least) helped 

work out the $95 million in funding from INDOT. 

photo: Carmel, IN official website 

Even my live tweeting of the speech brought out an opponent (along with several new followers from Carmel).

Mayor Brainard did comment frequently on another piece of the puzzle that I think probably facilitated the process: they had no real old downtown to redevelop. In fact, when he was running for mayor and knocking on doors, he asked about their downtown. He realized after a while that people were referring to different places when they talked about it. “People need to know where the center of town is,” he said. 

So they moved over a few blocks from what they agreed was a commercial center of town, and put in place a set of incentives and design standards that did indeed attract the investment they hoped for. Building up from scratch, it seems, is easier to control, especially when you have the commitment to design that Carmel has. 

I should also say that Carmel sounds a bit too contrived for me. I have never been a big fan of the kinds of giant developed communities like Ashburn, Virginia or Irvine, California. I like my urbanism messy, I guess, the way I like my nature.

But none of this detracts from the remarkable example that Carmel provides: with commitment, political will and influence (how else do you get $95 million dollars from a department of transportation?), and including walking and biking comfort in your design—and luck—you can get what you want for your community. 

Walking to Work

I’ve been walking to work lately. Since the first Snomaggedon of January 2014, my bike has coincidentally been under the weather. The subsequent Snopocalypti-quake and one

Downtown from a new perspective.

thing and another, and I’ve missed my once-a-week mechanic at work. 

So I walked. Of course it is much slower than my usual bike commute. Two miles on the bike is 10 or 12 minutes; the walk is a half hour door to door. I take a slightly more direct route, using Henry Street, a major arterial that I avoid when riding to work. 

I’ve ridden my bike to work or school for the past 30 years almost, some from necessity and some from choice. I’ve ridden in cities and small mountain towns. For the past seven years, I’ve ridden roughly every day into downtown Spartanburg, South Carolina. I certainly get more out of riding than I give; I have conversations with folks who are otherwise invisible to drivers, I get to experience dramatic cold and heat on my face and hands, I pass the world at 15 miles an hour instead of 35. 

So the walk has been a fairly eye-opening activity. Aside from walking to classes throughout college, I have generally chosen the faster, more athletic cycling for transportation. But as a runner for exercise, and now having gotten more into ultra marathons, walking is an activity I early practice but often employ in races. 

Scary narrowing of sidewalk
into the turn.

As with my biking, the walk has made me more aware of need for the types of facilities I advocate for—pedestrian oriented, even pedestrian prioritized. Walking along the Mary  Black Foundation Rail Trail I am relaxed, and look at vistas and skylines. I am slower than on my bike, so I can see more details in the neighborhoods I pass through. I notice impediments I don’t see from my bike or car.

I feel the difference between a buffered sidewalk and a sidewalk that is right on the curb. I feel the difference between crossing a narrow neighborhood street and a wide arterial at funny offset angles and right turning vehicles. 

And I see what a difference pedestrian friendliness does for travel. We move more slowly, ambling and enjoying the morning. On the Rail Trail, we say hello. 

Why not here?

Street artist scrubs images into the urban landscape

Twenty Seven Thoughts from the Association of Pedestrian and Bicycle Professional Professional Development Seminar

1. We try to make sure every project is a Complete Streets project. 
2. “Great” results from incrementally getting better.
3. We love the Charlotte Department of Transportation.
4. Whenever I run on concrete paths I think the orthopedic surgeons must have an interest in it.
5. Communities decide the uses of a street. 
6. Commerce happens at three miles an hour, not thirty miles an hour.
7. There is flexibility in transportation standards if you ask the right questions.
8. Right-size the streets.
9. This is about creating better communities. 
10. Design the whole street for all users.
11. We should liberate ourselves from conventional road classifications.
12. Communities decide the uses of a street. (See #5)
13. Speed becomes greed when it takes away a child’s ability to choose to walk.
14. Twenty is Plenty for US(A).
15. Lessening the barriers to active living increases individual motivation. 
16. “It’s my street. It’s my park.”
17. We love the 6-Step Process for Creating Successful Complete Streets Projects. (See #3)
18. First step from policy to practice: change procedures.
19. Getting ALL the stakeholders involved in street planning throughout the process  makes good streets.
20. I’m going to invite the right people to the next webinar I participate in.
21. We should ask, “How can we help solve the problem?”
22. Break down the silos.
23. Engage and educate the public, don’t design and defend.
24. Why pilot something that you know works elsewhere?
25. Change the functional classification to lower design speed.
26. The right combination of street classification and design speed makes great streets.
27. Why not here?

Thoughts on September 12, 2011

Ten years ago I started teaching at a new school, one I wasn’t very comfortable in. It was my first public school job, my first in a large school, with a large faculty. On September 11, 2001, I was teaching first period American Lit when we were told to stay put in our classrooms. Someone came in and told us to turn on the tv, which revealed the horror of the day.

One of the World Trade Center towers was on fire, having been hit by a plane about 15 minutes earlier. As I recall, we were all watching when the second plane hit, and the thought that this was an attack became more clear. Classes changed just as news of the Pentagon, some twenty minutes away, came on. I cried as I watched the first tower crumble, with no one around but two other teachers I had essentially just met.

I remember so many details of the day—

I remember crying about the deaths of people I’d never met, thinking that that is the connection others call God.

I remember crossing paths with one of my new students in an empty hallway, and stopping to hug him for a second.

I remember thinking that class should just go on, and that that would be a victory.

I remember asking my students to write about whatever they wanted on a day that writing about whatever we wanted took on new meaning and importance.

 I remember wanting to hold my children more than anything.

I remember learning about the heroism on Flight 93 in Pennsylvania, and, remarking that those guys were me, wondering if I would have had that courage.

I remember helping a woman the next day who had driven her car over the parking stop log, and saying, “They can bomb us, but they can’t keep us from being nice to each other.”

I remember one of the hardest running workouts I’ve ever done, on a beautiful sunny September 12.

I remember feeling more unified as a nation than I had ever felt in my lifetime.

I remember putting a flag on my car, and waving to others who did the same.

It’s that feeling of unity that I want to carry with me. We were all in those towers, in those planes, on those streets, in that Oval Office. A flag that had been the sign of provincial and ugly jingoistic nationalism for me became a symbol of a people, and a way to express our common humanity.

Having been born in the early 60s, my life has taken me through civil rights battles, Viet Nam War protests, Watergate, Reagan’s nuclear madness, a Gulf War, and more tangible divisive political, cultural and economic arguments. This day, though, and for some time afterward, we were focused on one common enemy.

Since that time, though, we’ve seen the eroding of any unified feeling. It happened slowly at first, when W decided to invade Iraq, for example. But it has now degraded to childish obstinacy and intolerance. We can’t see anyone else’s point of view; we can’t compromise for fear of seeming, well, like we’re working together for a cause. We refuse to see that despite our differences in “how,” the “why” of making our country better should bring us together.

So today, what I want to remember is feeling like a part of a nation for the first and only time in my life. I’ll remember that it’s possible, and hope that it doesn’t take another attack to make it happen.

Eleven Thoughts While Riding to Work

1.       Wore a vest this morning on my ride.

2.       There’s always one. Today there were two.

3.       I still haven’t stopped to pick the prickly pears.

4.       I saw three people riding for transportation today, besides me. All of us were men.

5.       How do we let others know we are there?

6.       Would you rather run a hundred yards in high heels, or ten miles in the woods?

7.       When there’s an app for that, what do folks who still use dumb phones do?

8.       My desire to have fenders is in direct inverse proportion to my love for my hot ride.

9.       I’ve ridden almost 2150 miles since February 2010, (almost) all of it for transportation.

10.   I’ve about worn out my handlebar grips.

11.   It’s just more fun to ride my bike.

This Week's Best Reads, 8-26-11

The helmet vs. no-helmet controversy and the effects on bike sharing programs:

 http://www.grist.org/biking/2011-08-22-helmet-laws-get-in-way-of-bike-sharing-programs

Retrofitting the suburbs:  http://www.grist.org/cities/2011-08-22-levitt-to-beaver-suburbia-gets-a-mixed-use-makeover

Michelle Bachmann’s “logic” about $2/per gallon gas http://www.grist.org/list  

Pop-up urbanism: neon bikes in Toronto  http://www.treehugger.com/files/2011/08/neon-bicycles-pop-up-toronto.php

Photo: Good

“Depaving,” complete streets and other ideas for cutting infrastructure expenditures from Neal Peirce: http://dc.streetsblog.org/2011/08/22/from-minneapolis-ten-street-design-solutions-to-transform-your-city/ 

The website for “River Time,” a film about my friend John Lane’s paddle to the sea from his backyard in Upstate SC:  http://rivertimefilm.com/   

Fifteen Thoughts While Riding to Work

1.       Why do people complain about traffic safety and drive dangerously at the same time?

2.       If you wave to other active commuters a couple of times, they become your friends.

3.       An 86 year old woman killed in a crosswalk? Really?

4.       Sometimes I wonder why I read these things before I get on my bike.

5.       I’ll say it again (and probably again): Roads are only safe when the users make them that way.

6.       The prickly pears on the beaver tail cacti I pass on the way to work are ripening.

7.       Urban orchards are a cool idea.

8.       Daily watering leads to shallow roots leads to weak grass.

9.       Even without bike lanes and traffic, I bet I win on short trips.

10.   There seems to be more chatter about helmets or no helmets lately.

11.   I wear a helmet for the same reason I wear a seatbelt.

12.   Arguing about helmets seems to avoid the greater issue of safe biking facilities.

13.   I wonder what it would be like to go for a run with Robert Frost.

14.   What kind of running shoes would Wallace Stevens wear? Firecats, of course.

15.   I run far. Other people run farther. This will not change.

Thirteen Thoughts While Riding to Work

1.       Drivers expect us to act like cars, and then get mad at us when we do.

2.       The center line of the traffic light trigger loop is the most sensitive.

3.       What if I left hooked you like you right hooked me?

4.       Riding on the left side of a one-way street is a little disconcerting.

5.       It’s nice to feel a little chilly today.

6.       If you’re late for work, do you have to take it out on me?

7.       Thanks for waving.

8.       Thanks for waiting.

9.       Thanks for not running me over.

10.   I go over the speed limit downtown.

11.   Should sheriff’s deputies model good driving behavior, or turn right on red despite the signs while talking on a cell phone?

12.   I still don’t understand why people insist upon watering their lawns with our drinking water.

13.   What’s your rush when I get to the traffic light when you do?

Twenty Seven Thoughts While Riding to Work

1.       Despite all the efforts to structure the streets more safely, safety lies in the actions of the people who use them.

2.       Some people may never get the idea.

3.       You can’t argue with stupid people, who continue to argue their point even when they know it’s wrong.

4.       The tree covered streets of my neighborhood are much cooler than the streets of the downtown area.

5.       Electromagnetic loops respond mostly to cars.

6.       Right on red should be against the law in any area with a lot of pedestrians.

7.       Stop lines are not for a car’s rear wheels.

8.       Intersections are especially scary when crossing drivers roll to a non-stop.

9.       Never underestimate the impatience of a driver turning left.

10.   Facebook mobs are scary.

11.   I shouldn’t be surprised by those who refuse to believe clear evidence.

12.   Violence is easier said than done.

13.   Too easy, in fact.

14.   Don’t let anyone ruin your peace.

15.   Wheels in city government move slowly.

16.   Wheels in people’s minds move more slowly.

17.   Dangerous road conditions facilitate laziness.

18.   Being a contributing member of a group makes us happy.

19.   Crossing the street mid-block is not a revolutionary act.

20.   Though there is safety in numbers, sometimes a crowd makes me nervous.

21.   Riding through town is a friendly act.

22.   I’m glad my coffee cup fits in a bottle rack.

23.   The hardest part about riding to work in the summer is not sweating.

24.   All road users break laws sometimes.

25.   Helmets may look dorky, but no helmet looks stupid.

26.   Slick tires roll fast.

27.   Riding my bike to work is an act of happiness.

This week in interesting reading 6-17-11

File this one in the “duh” file… http://www.shareable.net/blog/Portland-Finds-Bike-Friendly-Policies-Boost-Local-Economy

Pedestrian-only streets are making a comeback  http://www.shareable.net/blog/a-simple-idea-to-transform-the-life-of-our-cities

Ticketed for riding in the bike lane…  http://www.planetizen.com/node/49801 

The importance of corners  http://www.huffingtonpost.com/charles-r-wolfe/corners-as-baseline-for-u_b_875489.html

Who knew? Carmel, IN, the City of Roundabouts http://content.usatoday.net/dist/custom/gci/InsidePage.aspx?cId=indystar&sParam=47449000.story 

A better helmet http://www.grist.org/list/2011-06-16-cardboard-bike-helmets-are-safer-than-plastic 

Though they have no idea why (shorter trips? Less experienced riders taking fewer chances? More experienced riders riding in safer places?), it appears that those riding shared bikes are involved in fewer accidents than those riding their own bikes.  http://www.streetsblog.org/2011/06/16/from-london-to-d-c-bike-sharing-is-safer-than-riding-your-own-bike/  

Community development corporation and community land trust have similar mission, opposing tactics.  http://americancity.org/buzz/entry/3022/

Hazel Borys on Agrarian Urbanism http://placeshakers.wordpress.com/2011/06/17/the-allure-of-food-its-not-just-a-lifestyle-its-a-life/    

A Week's Worth of Interesting Reading

Several new parks being developed in Philadelphia depend on “heavy underwriting from philanthropic foundations, nonprofits, and private institutions.”

DC’s BikeShare program’s popularity causing supply problems

Architect Steven Fleming discusses his architectural focus on bicycles and bicycling, which he calls “Cycle Space.”

A call for more challenging park designs

An informal study shows no one really cares about smoking or not smoking in NYC’s Bryant Park.

I’m glad someone else thinks riding your bike is good for the soul

What crows tell us about ourselves, and evidence that crows don’t hate Dick Cheney.

Agriculture fitted into the Transect, for all you planner geeks.

My Front Yard Garden

I participated in a workshop a week or so ago with Tom Low and Guy Pearlman of the architectural and planning group, DPZ.  Any workshop about place-making gets me worked up, and I especially looked forward to this one with Tom Low.

Low has been advocating for form-based development codes for many years, in particular transect based planning, which looks at the entire span of development from city core to rural and wild areas. The standards are based not so much on the particular activity on a piece of land, and encourages mixed uses, scattering housing and stores and restaurants and offices, parks and schools in patterns that encourage walking and biking. The design of the buildings, and the number of buildings allowed changes as you get farther from the city center. Buildings in different contexts--urban to rural--should look different, as row houses differ from single-family homes. Low and Pearlman used the metaphor that the transect begins in the urban core and feathers outward. The codes allow for great place-making, as communities can decide what areas will be densest and what areas will be protected open space.

But even the transect, Low said, has become somewhat outdated. These days, folks want more local food; farmers markets have proliferated significantly in the past few years. So in addition to design standards, green space designation, and density regulation, the new transect should include areas for growing food.

What does a garden look like in the city core? How about in the first ring of suburbs? Some communities now allow residents to grow gardens in the right of way between the sidewalk and the street, which is often prohibited to allow for utility work. New community designs, new infill developments, indeed all developments, should include plans for community gardens, for example, and the zoning regulations should allow for them by right. Cities like Detroit already allow community gardening on city-owned vacant lots.

I like to plant food, and have for most of my adult life. I’m not an expert, and my favorite plants are those that don’t require a lot of tending, but I like picking lettuce, or Swiss chard, or tomatoes, or herbs from my yard for dinner. I tried a garden in my current home’s back yard, but it proved to be far too shady. So I dug up some more grass in the much sunnier front yard, and I plant there. I’ve had reasonable success, with two plantings last growing season, and have managed to have fresh produce over a period of quite a few months.

I try to keep my garden neat, and it’s small, and many of the plants are pretty. Tomatoes can get out of control, though, and I try not to let that worry me.  I left the hot peppers on the plant the past two years, after Quinn and I tried a couple, and they turned orange and red, dangling like ornaments.

I don’t plant there to be rebellious, though in this neighborhood there aren’t a lot of front-yard gardens. I plant there because growing some of my own food has always been comforting, and rewarding. I’ve had a number of conversations about the garden with passers-by (this is a very walkable neighborhood). I’m not quite sure what the others think.

Earlier this spring, a couple walked by with their dog. They stopped to chat as I weeded or otherwise puttered about the unplanted garden. “What are you planting this year?” they asked. My wife works in retail, and one day someone she was helping said, “I know you, you have a garden in your front yard.”

Crossing Over Water

Most everyone knows I love the Cottonwood Trail, a small trail system that winds through the flood plain of the Lawson’s Fork Creek with a trailhead less than a mile from my house. I have often blamed the trail and its owner the Spartanburg Area Conservancy (SPACE) for my moving to Spartanburg because I ran on it during a weekend visit to town to interview for a job.  Now nine years later I have run on the trail hundreds of times in all weather and every season, in deep untracked snow, sloppy mud, and dry dust. Right now wild roses bloom, and the creek flows deep. I have enjoyed seeing the system expand. I also now serve on the SPACE board, in part because of my commitment to the trail.

from SPACE website

But one part of the trail system is one of my favorite third places—the wetlands area, now crossed by a boardwalk that allows visitors to rest in the middle of one of the most interesting environments in Spartanburg. I’ve seen owls, deer, songbirds of many sorts, turtles and other amphibious critters on my crossings of the wetlands. Mounds and tufts of green pop up from the water, which rises and lowers according to the season and the particular drought conditions. Those wild roses climb toward the sun, and skeletal trees stripped of bark and limbs are scattered among the living flora. The place has even been the site of scarecrow weddings, courtesy of Hub-Bub artists-in-residence a few years ago.

But beyond the scenery, I have a thing for crossing over water. All the usual feelings—elemental, cleansing, flow—these all play into my crossings. But there’s a pull, indescribable, I reckon, even for one who tries to describe all things. I don’t always feel that tugging toward water, but a few places around have left me physically and psychically moved.

A few years ago I had a job in Inman, and my route to work crossed over the headwaters of the Lawson’s Fork, just before the various streams coalesce into one, the spot where maps first identify it as the Lawson’s Fork. The road descends into the floodplain, crosses the waters and rises again. There I feel a pull distinct from gravity, one that drew me both into the waters and downstream somehow at the same time. I, like the water, coalesced into stream, and the sensation felt healing.

Another of my favorite Lawson’s Fork crossings is over the abandoned bridge at Glendale. Our SPACE board meetings are held at Wofford’s Glendale Shoals Environmental Center, and late for my first meeting, I parked on the south side of the bridge and walked over to save the time of driving the longer way around.

The bridge passes over the calm pond created by the mill dam, over which water spills in cascades, proceeding on its eastward run over the Glendale Shoals that paddlers play in throughout the spring, and where my children have played over the years we’ve visited the Shoals. I have always loved the place where water fall over drops, whether natural or human-made like this one. There’s a solidity that reminds me of the substantial part of water, combined with the constant moving which reminds me of the ephemeral element of water, where you can’t put you foot in the same river twice, the philosopher tells us. The Shoals are a dynamic place, shifting with the rising and lowering of the creek levels.

All these crossings of the Lawson’s Fork keep me feeling a part of the flow of waters of the Earth, even just this small volume a universe itself. Every crossing is new, a ritual re-enactment of every other crossing if I let it, new water and ancient passage, changing course and matter.