Trail marking

[jbeegoode]

Many grids are very wobbly. One thing that I love about Tucson is that we're alliteratively new. All the streets are set from a sectional grid, all tidy mile squares. The major street's intersections are one mile apart. I learned the street names and was able to get around in a very short time. directions are easy. My house was 13 thousand something. Thirteen miles from the center of town. Then we changed it, choosing the name of our street by petition. Suddenly, My street was running east and west and had just four numbers.

We do have a river road that isn't straight, but runs generally east to west and is old. Some are diagonal to contours and have been around since the Spanish settled the area.

During the equinox the sun sets directly in the middle of the road, causing accidents. 

It helps that there are no surprises on the curves, especially when carnuding. The streets are nice and wide. Inside the squares the streets are haywire, but generally north and south.
Jbee

[nuduke]

One disappointment about my 3 trips to the USA is that the totally logical block system of laying out US cities that we learn about in school actually is less easy to understand in practice.  Your examples below show how the exception is as common as the rule!
Land of the free, you see.
John

[Hymie]

Most everywhere in our state now that is "wilderness" is leased by hunting clubs with cameras on every other tree to check out the game. No place is safe the walk naked anymore. The only nudity I can enjoy anymore is in my home.

[BlueTrain]

We've talked about risk and danger here before, so "safe" can be somewhat relative, same as risk.

Something to remember here is that there are state forests, state parks, local parks, wildlife management areas, national forests and national parks. There are also privately owned places open to the public (campgrounds and parks) as well as privately owned places not open to the general public, which include nudist clubs. All have different management, mostly different philosophies and different rules. But none of them are your own lands which means you have to follow such rules as there are, at least when someone is watching.

The rest of the world is divided into two parts. The part you own and everywhere else. But a lot of other lands are wide open for recreational use, with certain limitations. Hunting probably has more restrictions than anything else. The use of motor vehicles is probably second. Nevertheless, there are good opportunities out there to be had, more in some places than in others and possibly nonexistent in some. Some of that land is federally owned, though leased users (and others with no lease) may treat it as their own. Conditions may change over the years, though. I do know that in some places, access has been made more difficult or that places have been posted with no trespassing signs, sometimes for good reason, others for no reason at all.

Rather makes you want to join a club.

[Greenbare Woods]

One disappointment about my 3 trips to the USA is that the totally logical block system of laying out US cities that we learn about in school actually is less easy to understand in practice.  Your examples below show how the exception is as common as the rule!
Land of the free, you see.
John

It depends on where you go.   New York City was renovated in the 19th century and the new plan is a square grid.   A few miles north, Boston streets followed cow paths as pastures became residential.  New York laid out by city planners.  Boston laid out by cows. 

The town I grew up in had a big river so the main street ran along beside the river and was more or less parallel to the river.  In the middle of town some streets were laid at right angles, square, to the main street, and thus square to the river.  A little farther over they laid a long street due north and south.  Cross streets in that section are due east/west.   Where the two sections of town intersect you get a lot of 35 degree corners and confusion.   Another section of town was laid out on some other directions that don't seem to match any topography.   

JBee lives in a flat desert which was created by people who drove everywhere they went, mostly by people who drove air conditioned cars.  Wide streets with main cross streets every mile makes sense for an automobile city.  Older cities in the US and other places were mostly built by people who walked where they were going so everything is close together.    Fascinating history in cities.

 

[nudewalker]

Conventional wisdom in West Virginia was that roads were laid out by offering surveyors moonshine as they made their way. The best moonshiners had the roads put nearest their farms. Others were old Indian paths or following snakes around.

[BlueTrain]

That sounds very much like my hometown, too. There is a nice grid for the older part of town with a large section to the west that is at an angle but still maintaining the grid format. More recent housing developments are clearly designed with cars in mind and have those curving lanes common to newer suburbs. Nothing is really close enough for walking. In the 1950s and into the early 60s, most of the businesses were concentrated in a three or four block stretch of one street. There are no surviving businesses there today. Most were independent, some were franchises and a few were chains stores like the A&P and G.C. Murphy. It was and still is the county seat and the courthouse was several blocks away. Everything to do with county business or legal affairs was centered around the courthouse.

The town fell on hard times when the main employer left town about 40 years ago. I used to think that accounted for the decrepit condition of the downtown business district. But the town supports a couple of huge car dealerships--outside of town--and there is a Wal-Mart and Lowes on the outskirts of town, too. So I've decided that it would look just the same even if the main employer were still there, which employed 1,000 men (railroad shops). That's the story of towns large and small everywhere, it seems, and it isn't good.

Most of the town is hilly, too, which complicates a grid street layout system.

[BlueTrain]

That post about West Virginia roads posted before I was finished with the one I just made. My hometown is in West Virginia and my comments were only about that town. However, I'd say most roads were created by people who were not surveyors, although surveyors were in the area in the mid-1700s. They were established by the time-honored method of widening a trail that went from point A to point B to point C and so on. A surveyor would have laid out the road so it went from point A to point Z, skipping all the places where people actually live. In fact, that is still being done. We call them bypasses. Businesses move from downtown out to the bypass, because that's where the traffic is. Then a few years later, a new bypass is needed so through traffic doesn't have to go through the business section anymore with all it's traffic lights. Ultimately, we have interstates.

Building roads in West Virginia is difficult but it is of great assistance for people who want to leave.

[rrfalcon]

When my brother in law first moved to the US I tried to picture how long was the street he lived in that his address was 3027. But of course he was only on the third block, and the street wasn’t very long at all.

In most of the US, number 3027 would be the 30th block, not the 3rd block.   Its a grid pattern intended mostly for government employees like police, firemen, postmen, etc., to find the address quickly.   Street number 0 is at the center of town.  Here in Spokane street 0 is called "Division Street."  In Albuquerque it was called "Central Ave."   Each city and/or county has its own system so the grid changes when you enter a neighboring county. 

Since we're a long way out of town our number is 35210 which would mean its near 352nd street if there were streets.  Over in Seattle, on the other side of our state, they do have all those streets.  North of Seattle North 205th Street is the same as South 244th Street south from Everett.  They also have a code known to locals about the direction.  It the road runs east and west they call it a "street" and put the "North" or "NE" ahead of the number.  If the road runs north and south they call it an "avenue" and put the "South" or "SW" behind the number.   If you see an address like "24103 48th Ave. W" you know it runs north and south, its 48 blocks west of the dividing line, and its 241 blocks south of the center of the city of Everett.

In King County, which is Seattle, they removed streets names about 50 years ago and gave them all grid pattern numbers.  Named streets have a more human feel than numbers, but police and firemen could not quickly remember the names of thousands of named street.  They haven't done that in Spokane County.  If you aren't local you have no idea even witch way to go.  I've lived outside of Spokane for more than 12 years now, and I only know the names of major streets. 

The new Google Maps or equal systems can find named places really fast.  I suppose that tech will eliminate the need for numbered streets.

I have heard frustration from Japan where their house numbers are assigned in chronological order of construction.   House 3219 may be next to house 193.  And house 194 may be 3 miles down the street in the other direction if it was built about the same year.  I would get really lost.

Some places in the US can also be confusing.  There are a couple of towns in Massachusetts (i forget which two, unfortunately) where the boundary between the towns is the middle of a road. Like most US towns, the house numbers are odd on one side of the street, and even on the other. Bad news - the towns don't use the same side of the street.  So, there are (for instance) two houses that are #400 Boundary Street - you have to know which town the house is in to find the right house.

[Greenbare Woods]

The town fell on hard times when the main employer left town about 40 years ago. I used to think that accounted for the decrepit condition of the downtown business district. But the town supports a couple of huge car dealerships--outside of town--and there is a Wal-Mart and Lowes on the outskirts of town, too. So I've decided that it would look just the same even if the main employer were still there, which employed 1,000 men (railroad shops). That's the story of towns large and small everywhere, it seems, and it isn't good.

Most of the town is hilly, too, which complicates a grid street layout system.

There was a big Costco membership store in North Spokane until about 2  years ago.   Costco built an even bigger store half a mile farther north -- across the city line.   Costco said they would save enough money just on City Taxes to pay for the whole new store in only one (1) year.   The demise of city centers is not all because people won't shop there.  Cities push retail out of town by regulations and taxes.   Most US cities also push shoppers out of town with parking meters that amount to taxes on shopping in the city.  Old derelict down town districts are created by incompetent city governments, not by a merchants or customers. 

[BlueTrain]

I realize that it's way off the subject but there is interest in the matter. Governments large and small everywhere in this country struggle with taxes and expenses. Yet do we want the likes of huge multinational corporations essentially running our lives and making us dependent on them instead of someone we elected? The dollar you spend at Wal-Mart, which has the best prices in town, leaves town the following morning. The men running the big box stores have zero interest in your local affairs. They won't fix the road just before the next election. And everything ever said about Wal-Mart, mostly true, was being said about Sears, Roebuck a hundred years ago. Where I'm from, as well as where I live now, the local and independent merchants didn't move out of town. They went out of business.

If government is so bad, why have one? We have elected too many people in our governments who are determined that government do nothing or do nothing well. You could write to Greg Penner and see if he could help in some way. Couldn't hurt.

[Greenbare Woods]

I realize that it's way off the subject but there is interest in the matter. Governments large and small everywhere in this country struggle with taxes and expenses. Yet do we want the likes of huge multinational corporations essentially running our lives and making us dependent on them instead of someone we elected?

Given a choice between government running our lives and making us dependent and having to deal with corporations I would take the corporations every time.  Corporations do not send gangs of gun thugs (police) to take our money and send us to hellhole prisons if we don't obey.  Corporations only exist by providing us with goods or services we want at a price and convenience we can afford.  Any corporation that fails to satisfy the people ends up like Montgomery Wards, or Toys-R-US.   Governments large and small operate primarily to make their chosen elite rich and powerful.  We have no choice like we do with corporations.  Their hired thugs enforce their all powerful laws.

As for small businesses going out of business, yes large corporations and small businesses have to provide for our needs or they vanish.  Many people like me won't go down town because parking meters and parking tickets are so offensive.  Any business down town has to provide something I can't get elsewhere, so I don't care if they all vanish.  City Council is their enemy, not me.   

[jbeegoode]

Hey Bob, "Governments large and small operate primarily to make their chosen elite rich and powerful.  We have no choice like we do with corporations.  Their hired thugs enforce their all powerful laws."

While there are many great truths to what you say here, My logical conclusion doesn't correspond with yours. Corporations and rich and powerful are the same entity. Government is owned and controlled by these, either on a national, local, or world level.

We don't have any control over the oligarchic owners, just as we the people had no control over the aristocracies that owned and controlled, or control over any robber baron. The money controls the government, the thugs, and make the all powerful laws which benefit them and further consolidate the control and wealth.

I'll trust a local government that I can participate in, you can trust an entity, which has a mandated structure to ONLY increase profit for those with the wealth to invest. A CEO that invests in the public interests, or any altruism and not solely in increasing profit, doesn't stay CEO, doesn't get to make the wages of kings. It is like a shark, an eating machine that has no interest in the welfare of the "peasants" below. All of my experience shows me a ruthless dangerous system. Free market fixes (the hype given to us by some think tanks) have never historically worked. Eventually, they fall into an aristocratic elite and we the people are pawns in an inhuman game, fighting their wars and having the life choked out of us, powerless.
Jbee

[jbeegoode]

Most everywhere in our state now that is "wilderness" is leased by hunting clubs with cameras on every other tree to check out the game. No place is safe the walk naked anymore. The only nudity I can enjoy anymore is in my home.

That kind of goes against the idea of "wilderness." That isn't hunting, That's going out and killing animals. Hunting to me, is learning about them, watching them, knowing their habits and then when the season starts, kill them. There is no wood craft. None of those tools that we sometimes incorporate as stealth naturists. A hidden camera is weak, no sport, BS, empty bravado. Weak. Smelling, watching, tracking, knowing nature, moving like a warrior, now, that's hunting.

I'm sure that I would be considering becoming a camera hunter in those circumstances. Sneaking up behind them with foam, spray-paint, making a captured collection of them like geocaches. Now then that IS hunting, and it can be done naked, too!

Spying on people who are out in the woods for solitude and freedom is just wrong. I'd bet that someone stealing those cameras would be popular, like Bonny and Clyde, John Dillinger, or some Eco-warriors.
Jbee

[BlueTrain]

Hunting first and foremost is trying to find something, including game. If there is no effort involved in searching, it isn't called hunting. It can be called stalking or just plain shooting. Hunters and others who shoot (or shoot at) game under any conditions, legally at least, pay for the privilege. Are you willing to pay for things you do in the great outdoors?

Although there are several reasons I live to tramp around in the woods, chief among them is to see wildlife, for which I pay nothing. I don't get away from home much these days, however, but there are plenty of woods right out my back door, with all the accompanying mud, insects and stickers. I see as much wildlife on my walks from home as I do if I drive 90 miles to Skyline Drive and the Appalachian Trail or George Washington National Forest.  Only I can't do anything nude. That would be foolish. But I am keeping tabs on a beaver pond these days, which has proved to be both particularly interesting and rewarding. Beaver do not keep the same hours that I do, unfortunately, and I've only caught sight of one once. I've seen more foxes.

That particular area where the beaver pond is, is posted for hunting in season (and this is a suburban neighborhood 20 miles from the back door of the White house, too). Bow hunting only, of course.  Year before last (16/17 season) there were two game cameras attached to trees. I avoided the area until the season was past.

When there are multi-national corporations controlling practically all the local commerce, local business all but cease to exist. But local businessmen was the pool from which local civic leaders were drawn. And big business does everything in its power to make everyone else powerless, including destroying unions, essentially threatening county or city governments over tax issues. Any corporation can make bad decisions just as well as it can do things to destroy the competition. You may think competition is a good thing but do you think corporations think the same thing?

Enough on this topic. I think I'll go check on the beaver pond. He (or it) has had a lot of work keeping his dam in good shape, what with all the rain we've had lately.