Committee on the Environment

about the approach into tourist towns

  • 1.  about the approach into tourist towns

    Posted 08-15-2014 06:24 PM
    This message has been cross posted to the following Discussion Forums: Committee on the Environment and Regional and Urban Design Committee .
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    Friday, August 15, 2014

    Can we Learn from Williamsburg?

    There are plenty very lovely small towns all over the US, many of which I described in an earlier article (Is Small Town America the Home of Happiness?). But no matter how lovely their center may be, to get there one has to fight through layers of gas stations, fast food joints, billboards, abandoned, shopping centers, and cheap motels; in short, the usual junk that even small towns unfailingly produce in abundance. This is true whether one approaches Frederick, Hagerstown, or Chestertown in Maryland, Lancaster in Pennsylvania, Portland in Maine, or Arvada or Golden in Colorado. Even places that luck placed into a setting of great natural beauty like the town of Chincoteague, located on a barrier island and approached via miles on a causeway with nothing but marshes left and right, are marred by what seem like thousands of billboards rammed into the swamps even more frequently than the telephone poles......
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    Klaus Philipsen FAIA
    Archplan Inc. Philipsen Architects
    Baltimore MD
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