Abandoned streets and subdivisions, peach trees and egrets
Just as it is no fun watching our parents decline, it is equally dismal to stand idly by while our small towns and countryside turn to crap increasingly fast in these tough times. Despite it all, there are patches of perfect bucolic existence amidst the mindless expansion and supposed growth.
Perhaps the single biggest blight on the Oconee County, Georgia landscape is what one blueberry farmer/DUI teacher friend of mine calls PVC farms. They are developments built by developers with the best of intentions and greed of getting the eggs of the golden goose before that goose has been cooked. I am in no way suggesting that people do not have the right to do with their property exactly what they want to, but instead suggesting that once they have done or attempted to do, and failed, then the greater good of the neighborhood should at least be considered in a larger context of public safety and passive if not active recreational possibilities.
My recent longer bike escapades down Old Bishop Road and Barnett Shoals Road have revealed paved streets with padlocked fences preventing people from finding out what lurks behind these areas. What can be done when one has spent a ton of money to get this land cleared and ready for people to move in, yet the houses are not even built. If there is any more emblematic symbol of the difficult economic times we are in, I would not know what it is.
I am going to start taking photographs of these symbols of suburban blight. What are we to do with these? Perhaps make the government take them over to create parks for people to recreate? Should we abandon the railroad tracks to create a parking place for cars that almost never move and only end of getting tagged with gang signs and graffiti? Are rails-to-trails a better solution for this areas instead of the continued neglect received from the nearly impregnable fiefdom of railroad governance.
It does not seem there is a whole hell of a lot for kids to do in Bishop besides get in trouble. At least the city of North High Shoals has a park and a new school. Bishop has the University of Georgia Equestrian Facility and damn near nothing else built since they had their own semi-failed subdivision of TownSide development in the heart of the small town.
Although I will admit to having seen my favorite Athens-Clarke County ex-bike cop wandering around Bishop as well as a pack of unruly youth littering an aluminum Dr. Pepper can near the small chain-netted basketball goal at the Bishop Baptist Church. I let my son slam dunk his frustrations away and I salute the church for leaving a ball by the small paved court. I love Bishop and think it is a great small town but it breaks my heart to see it dying slowly out of neglect and lack of people moving to this lovely little town.
I believe in the gospel of basketball, and I also think we can treat our land and old small towns a whole lot better. But I felt redeemed the other night for having seen an egret on a shriveling pond on Old Bishop Road the other night, not to mention a long grove of fruitful peach trees needing picking.
I hope we can come to some conclusion about converting these abandoned developments back to skate parks or other areas for our kids to play in safe supervised areas to recreate safely rather than watching nature slowly take by over these areas of supposed growth. May we find some solution that is acceptable to the land owners, the neighbors, the developers and the government in all our best interests? Only if you get involved in deciding what to do and how to do it.
As a footnote, most of these photographs today were snapped by my 10 year old son Lowell Matthews on a leisurely drive around Oconee County this Sunday.
This is an example of excellent redevelopment and I do not know the story behind this "Texaco" down Barnett Shoals Road. I praise it as the kind of creative reuse of an area that is attractive, educational and visually compelling. The Mike Thornton small former gas station house in downtown Watkinsville is another prime example of outstanding amd imaginative re-imagining of a structure. We have a lot of beautiful spaces here in Oconee County that we can really be proud of and have not begun to market in the least. If anyone knows the back story of this property, I would love to hear it.
This is a nice old house going to back to nature a bit closer to the Clarke County line. If I won lottery tomorrow I would make it my business to rebuild this glorious country manors in a manner consistent with historic renovations using as many local artisans and crafters in recapturing the glory from another bygone era.
Oconee County has a history, good and bad, black and white, young and old, and it needs to be told in a coherent and colloquial manner. The Oconee County Democratic Committee sponsored a series of discussions about the history of the city of Watkinsville that revealed the location of the fabled "Big Springs" that was the namesake of the town before the Eagle Tavern came about 20 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
What little history we have left should be preserved as much as possible. There are not going to be as many tiny towns like Bishop for our children to live in unless we agree to take steps to preserve the small town way of life and architecture. I do not pretend to have the magic answer on just to go about doing that, but I know I have spent a lifetime trying to learn about the history and how to best preserve it. I thank you for taking the time to read this screed and check out the photographs by my son.
I should acknowledge that the city councils are something I covered for years and none of the blame should be taken by them or any of their members in this rave. A lot of the decline is outside of the city limits of the small towns and sometimes the mailing address of the area goes well outside the municipality's city limits. Bishop took their time in converting their city hall from a tiny former jail to a nice house in the cross roads of 441 South and Old Bishop Road - which I must admit I do not remember right now what the street is called inside the city limits and surely will get a reminder next time I see Miss Nedra Johnson at some kind of political gahtering. We both have Iowa in our family's backgrounds and might just one day run into each other at the Iowa State Fair in August in Des Moines. Not likely this year for me, but you never know.
Perhaps the single biggest blight on the Oconee County, Georgia landscape is what one blueberry farmer/DUI teacher friend of mine calls PVC farms. They are developments built by developers with the best of intentions and greed of getting the eggs of the golden goose before that goose has been cooked. I am in no way suggesting that people do not have the right to do with their property exactly what they want to, but instead suggesting that once they have done or attempted to do, and failed, then the greater good of the neighborhood should at least be considered in a larger context of public safety and passive if not active recreational possibilities.
My recent longer bike escapades down Old Bishop Road and Barnett Shoals Road have revealed paved streets with padlocked fences preventing people from finding out what lurks behind these areas. What can be done when one has spent a ton of money to get this land cleared and ready for people to move in, yet the houses are not even built. If there is any more emblematic symbol of the difficult economic times we are in, I would not know what it is.
I am going to start taking photographs of these symbols of suburban blight. What are we to do with these? Perhaps make the government take them over to create parks for people to recreate? Should we abandon the railroad tracks to create a parking place for cars that almost never move and only end of getting tagged with gang signs and graffiti? Are rails-to-trails a better solution for this areas instead of the continued neglect received from the nearly impregnable fiefdom of railroad governance.
It does not seem there is a whole hell of a lot for kids to do in Bishop besides get in trouble. At least the city of North High Shoals has a park and a new school. Bishop has the University of Georgia Equestrian Facility and damn near nothing else built since they had their own semi-failed subdivision of TownSide development in the heart of the small town.
Although I will admit to having seen my favorite Athens-Clarke County ex-bike cop wandering around Bishop as well as a pack of unruly youth littering an aluminum Dr. Pepper can near the small chain-netted basketball goal at the Bishop Baptist Church. I let my son slam dunk his frustrations away and I salute the church for leaving a ball by the small paved court. I love Bishop and think it is a great small town but it breaks my heart to see it dying slowly out of neglect and lack of people moving to this lovely little town.
I believe in the gospel of basketball, and I also think we can treat our land and old small towns a whole lot better. But I felt redeemed the other night for having seen an egret on a shriveling pond on Old Bishop Road the other night, not to mention a long grove of fruitful peach trees needing picking.
I hope we can come to some conclusion about converting these abandoned developments back to skate parks or other areas for our kids to play in safe supervised areas to recreate safely rather than watching nature slowly take by over these areas of supposed growth. May we find some solution that is acceptable to the land owners, the neighbors, the developers and the government in all our best interests? Only if you get involved in deciding what to do and how to do it.
As a footnote, most of these photographs today were snapped by my 10 year old son Lowell Matthews on a leisurely drive around Oconee County this Sunday.
This is a nice old house going to back to nature a bit closer to the Clarke County line. If I won lottery tomorrow I would make it my business to rebuild this glorious country manors in a manner consistent with historic renovations using as many local artisans and crafters in recapturing the glory from another bygone era.
Oconee County has a history, good and bad, black and white, young and old, and it needs to be told in a coherent and colloquial manner. The Oconee County Democratic Committee sponsored a series of discussions about the history of the city of Watkinsville that revealed the location of the fabled "Big Springs" that was the namesake of the town before the Eagle Tavern came about 20 years after the signing of the Declaration of Independence.
What little history we have left should be preserved as much as possible. There are not going to be as many tiny towns like Bishop for our children to live in unless we agree to take steps to preserve the small town way of life and architecture. I do not pretend to have the magic answer on just to go about doing that, but I know I have spent a lifetime trying to learn about the history and how to best preserve it. I thank you for taking the time to read this screed and check out the photographs by my son.
I should acknowledge that the city councils are something I covered for years and none of the blame should be taken by them or any of their members in this rave. A lot of the decline is outside of the city limits of the small towns and sometimes the mailing address of the area goes well outside the municipality's city limits. Bishop took their time in converting their city hall from a tiny former jail to a nice house in the cross roads of 441 South and Old Bishop Road - which I must admit I do not remember right now what the street is called inside the city limits and surely will get a reminder next time I see Miss Nedra Johnson at some kind of political gahtering. We both have Iowa in our family's backgrounds and might just one day run into each other at the Iowa State Fair in August in Des Moines. Not likely this year for me, but you never know.
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