Nature education and bulldozers don't mix

What do the Whittier Narrows Natural Area, Ballona Wetlands, Abalone Cove Shoreline Park and Rancho Los Cerritos all have in common? At each location, officials have decided that nature education begins not with nature but with bulldozers.

In recent months, naturalareafan has learned that the proposed San Gabriel River Discovery Center isn't the only project in Southern California following the same worn-out recipe. Other projects that would require destruction of open space and wildlife habitat include:

- A proposed facility at the Ballona Wetlands -- as if the massive Playa Vista project didn't devour enough of the rare coastal wetland area

- A proposed facility at Abalone Cove Shoreline Park in Rancho Palos Verdes -- RPV already has a large coastal interpretive center

- A planned facility at Rancho Los Cerritos in Long Beach -- native plants were torn out and open space graded for the project

Most people would probably agree that Southern California is overbuilt and that open space is at a premium. So it seems truly strange that some people think destroying open space, wildlife habitat or public lands in order to put up yet more buildings is somehow ok.

But these projects have their critics.

There is the Friends lawsuit against the Discovery Center Authority, of course. And a group called Save Our Shoreline has an online petition that allows signers to express their opposition to the Abalone Cove project. And conservationists from the South Bay and the Westside have expressed their disappointment over the destruction of land at Ballona and Rancho Los Cerritos.

I invite you to sign the SOS petition. They're at 485 signature as I write this. Help put them over 500. Help keep the bulldozers out of our remaining wild places and open spaces.
--
Photo: Bulldozer, by MonsterPhotoISO, Flickr