My West | Column by Todd Wilkinson
Owning The Views: Architecture, Consumer Self Restraint and Zoning
By Todd Wilkinson, 5-31-06
Back in the late 1990s, a pink flare blazing the palette color of "Pepto-Bismol" was fired across the skyline of Durango, Colorado.
There, a pair of property owners decided to paint their home pink on one of the most prominent ridges above town -- much to the horror of longtime locals who considered it an act of aesthetic heresy.
Indeed, it has been an unspoken rule not only in Durango but also across America that no one is supposed to violate pieces of common rural landscape which hold communities together visually.
But welcome to the modern West. In recent years, every element of private property has been boiled down to an economic value and any zoning that might dampen that value now comes replete with a price tag, a lawsuit or a proclamation that liberty has been lost.
Who owns the views in our communities and does any entity have responsibility for preserving them?
This was a question I posed recently to students at Montana State University where I was invited to deliver a talk to budding building designers in the school of architecture.
The name of the class: "Personal Ethics." It was taught by professor Lori Ryker, one of the leading thinkers in the West when it comes to the topic of compatible architecture.
One of Ryker's academic brainchildren is a concept called "Remote Studio" in which students are removed from the urban college campus and submerged in wild and pastoral agricultural settings. Besides bringing their portable sketchbooks, Ryker loads them up with western literature ranging from the writings of Wallace Stegner to more contemporary observers.
Ryker has sometimes met with resistance from colleagues who believe it is the job of the university foremost to churn out young men and women competent in the technical and more generic aspects of architecture. Some of them pay little heed to the more intellectual questions of suitability as an expression of honoring "place".
Such meditations are considered too touchy feely for those who regard architecture with a practical vo-tech objectivity when pondering a new construction job. Indeed, interpreting architecture from a holistic approach is too activist, too close to swerving into the terra incognita of "liberal arts"; and too progressive so as to risk attracting the wrath of provincial legislators who scowl at the notion of spending public dollars filling students' minds with radical ideas like "green building".
Even if Remote Studio isn't always appreciated in Bozeman, big picture thinkers in American architecture recognize its value in interpreting the West's rural vernacular. Which is to say, better understanding and appreciating the broader language and dialects of architecture -- yes, fully comprehending the reasons why pioneer families made the decisions they did when, where and with what materials they used in building their homesteads.
Architecture can be a grand statement about personal ego. It can also be a vehicle for personal reflection and prostrating the footprint you bring to something larger.
Remote Studio, in the eyes of many, is a cutting edge concept. Ryker, along with her partner, Brett Nave, is trying to foster a larger Westwide discussion through the formation of Artemis Institute. Architecture students from across America now can spend a semester in Montana exploring the concepts of Remote Studio and receive upper level college credit.
As Ryker notes: "The Remote Studio provides an alternative educational program of architecture which challenges the primacy placed upon Cartesian conventions of methodology, objectivity, abstraction and process to allow students to explore their own creative directions as they are tied to the world around them."
However, when it comes to actually promoting compatible building and a good taste which respects community values such as common views, such is an ethic that arguably cannot be mandated by government in the simple sense. The first point of recognizing the sacredness of landscape begins with the conceptual ideas of the client and the collaboration that occurs with an architect as blueprints are put together.
One could assert that a very important element of the Codes of the West is this -- spelling out that when newcomers move to a place inhabited by others, be it Europeans in native homelands; Easterners (or west coasters) barnstorming the inner West; or suburban pilgrims seeking their own lifestyle vision quests by erecting ranchettes in former farm and ranch country -- they are expected to at least acknowledge local customs.
If they consciously choose to ignore these customs, then it is their choice but they do it at their own peril and at the risk of engendering community scorn. Yes, suffering a little social shame can go a long way.
But if you have the money to build something big, hey, why not do it?
The pink trophy home in Durango is no different from the 8,000-square foot McMansions of Montana; the neo-baronial log castles of Wyoming and Colorado; the adobe mega-casas of the Southwest or even the poorly sited mobile homes pitched into the middle of otherwise unending natural views. [For a glimpse of the latter, drive through Gillette, Wyoming, the boomtown service center for oil and gas production and coal mining occurring on the western prairie].
Is it a pompous and aesthetically elitist presumption to even think about compatible building design as something less than a socialist plot? Perhaps. Or perhaps not. Imagine the West if an "anything goes" approach to planning and zoning were adopted as standard protocol.
The paradox of Libertarianism, the religious belief that freedom to make any choice automatically means MORE OPPORTUNITY for self expression, is that eventually the clutter produced by compliant Libertarian-driven anti-planning and zoning may all end up looking like the same mess. Is there not a tyranny that accompanies those who have no aesthetic threshold imposing their will upon those who do?
Should the fate of sacred "viewsheds" in a community be left up to those who have no regard for them? Should the desire of one person who aspires to have property values appreciate by leaving a landscape more aesthetically attractive, naturally, be held hostage to the junkyard operator?
Theoretically, some will tell you the free market eventually cleans up blight but "the market" does not always have a human brain sympathetic to pretty vistas built in to it. The market can come up with the value of a sunset falling upon a soothing green plain but how much would it cost society if citizens were required to buy out every developer who is color blind and who believes his backyard cluttered with used tires is a work of art?
So let us ask again: Who owns the views? To be honest, I was impressed by the passion and intellect of students studying to be architects in Ryker's class at MSU, who took a whack at the question and who are thinking about the big picture.
New West wants to share one of the short essays written by MSU architecture student Troy W. Harris. Readers: You are invited to respond to the piece but please be gentle. Mr. Harris -- student Harris -- was not sparring for a fight. He is expressing his perspective as a young person about to enter the real working world. Welcome Troy W. Harris in making your debut as a writer.
By Troy W. Harris
Architecture Student
"Viewsheds" are something that people need to give concern to. A viewshed is something that everyone in a given region has a right to own together and when a person does something to destroy it, such as placing a structure in the sight line of it, or even right on top of it, that individual has stolen something from everyone in the community.
The fact of the matter is that there are ways around this and the person who owns the property is not the only individual who has the ability to stop this
destruction. Architects, the local governing body and even the community have the ability to take action to avoid this, but most of the time there is a lack of
concern for these actions until the devastation is done.
It should be important for these groups to take action from the start when they can actually make a change to the way it is envisioned. Architects have the ability to point out methods that would achieve both the goal of satisfying the client and the neighboring people by using intelligent sighting methods.
Local governing bodies should also take some responsibility in the matter. We have codes and ordinances that must be followed when constructing buildings that look out for the safety and the good of the people. Protecting view sheds is for the good of the people and smart site planning initiatives could be included in these regulations for the good of the public.
Finally, the public has the ability to act in a civil manner to protect the viewshed. However, there seems to be a lack of these actions and many viewsheds are forever lost. People find enjoyment and inspiration in viewsheds and when they are lost so is the sense of connection for people to the area.
Therefore, viewsheds should be protected through conscious thought by all factions who are involved or are affected by the possibility of them being lost.
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Thank you for a thoughtful discussion on the aethetics and ethics of how we perceive different landscapes and why we perceive them the way we do.
I don't know much about architecture per se, except for many trips through cathedrals and castles in Europe, but one that I do know is that the fundamental fault line we have to deal with in the West and throughout the country is between those of us who believe that personal action must bear a burden of public responsibility, and those who believe do as you want and the Devil take the hindmost. The former are communitarians, who believe also that markets must serve people, and the latter are libertarians, who believe that people serve (ostensibly free) markets. If you don't believe that, read a little libertarian literature--free markets are treated as God exercising His invisible hand to make our lives better. A social history of economics would clearly demontrated that free markets tend toward monopoly and certainly peoples' lives are not better for it. Now that every aspect of human existence has a price in some market somewhere, is it too difficult to see how distorted our lives have become?
The answer to an earlier question, who owns the views, is that no one "owns" them. They are something that has come down to us from the ages. Like the land itself, these views own us, not we them. Our responsibility is not to make of them what we will as if they are ours to keep or destroy, but pass them on for our descendants to perceive them as they will, and for them to do the same. Is not the same true of the great cathedrals of Europe? While the free marketers would certainly say it's ok for the moneychangers to work the cathedrals if there's a market for it--and no doubt there is--some of us might disagree with that and break out the whips. We have good precedent for it.
Thanks again.
Robert
Actually, I think you have that backwards. Those that are aesthically tone deaf may feel that the tyranny comes from those that don't own the property but have the arrogance to impose their tastes on others to comply with. Their response is usually for the offended to exercise their freedom of choice and look in the other direction. I for one hate pink houses and look away to avoid the Medusa effect.
On a very literal level, I would hate to live in a community that limits what color you can paint your house to a couple of bland flavors of paint and most them being vanilla. What riled people more in Durango was not just the color but the fact that it got applied to a home which was already a source of contention. It's construction to begin with made people mad. The fact that it was painted pink left them furious.
It seems to me that in a part of the country relying heavily on tourism, anything that harms the productivity of that industry is a problem for the neighbors whether that is hurting property values for ruining the viewsheds or turning off the tourists and neighbors who gaze upon that view shed.
A decade ago Routt County in Colorado instituted view protections, but only after views were lost. Once gone, they are gone forever and whatever memories people have of those views are forever marred. Take a look at the view coming out of the Wind River Canyon into Thermopolis some time. Would it have hurt those homeowners to move their houses back another 50' - I doubt it. It appears they only want to be seen; their view is not that much better for placing the house next to the rim. It leaves an impression on visitors about what kind of community they are coming into that they do not think enough of their own assets that they would allow something like that, and that hurts productivity and causes problems with the neighbors.
Rod Proffitt
Red Lodge
Geez Louise it was all we could do to get counties to agree to a minimal set-back and not to allow houses in the floodplain.
And yes, we were called communists in some of the local papers.
Ah well, what's the West if we can impale ourselves on the sword of hopeless optimism.
Your words, Todd, somehow seemed to carry a tad of irony or hypocrisy when you responded to Craig with the statement that "Something I always find entertaining is the property rights zealots always rant the loudest against planning and zoning, that is, until their neighbor does something they don't like and then they play the role of victim. "
I'm just unsure how one might reconcile that statement with your very vivid promotion of everyone else playing the role of victim and wanting action to be taken by them because THEIR neighbor does something they don't like.
As I write I am trying to visualize how you might justify *which* Pot is blacker than *which* Kettle.
BE CAREFUL WHAT YOU WISH FOR …
Or so it seems to me,
As I look out upon the world
And cringe at much I see!
“Short-sighted” is a word that fits
Too many who promote
Another law or regulation;
RIGHTS thereby demote.
What lobbying and legislation
Has ~ not YET! ~ curtailed,
We run the risk with judges, courts;
Our RIGHTS will be derailed.
Be careful if and when you seek
To satisfy a goal
By challenging those RIGHTS that “take”
Our Nation’s living soul.
Those RIGHTS were granted long ago;
They built our Nation strong;
They guarantee forevermore
YOUR own right to be WRONG!
Some of those RIGHTS were meant to let
Your Cabin be your Throne.
Some of those RIGHTS were to protect
Your neighbors’ RIGHTS to own.
If you can “take” away your neighbors’
RIGHTS he can take yours;
Expanded governmental power,
Something to deplore.
So right before you rise to shout,
“A Law! A Regulation!”
Why don’t you list those seen enforced
With balance, rationalization.
That POWER that you seek to place
In bureaucratic hands
May turn around and bite on YOU
When it flies home and lands!!!
… a musing from the West by Rose Mary Allmendinger
© 2006
Take Bozeman, and most growing centers in the West for example. As these towns grow at exponential rates, houses sprawl in every direction swallowing up open land. You can argue this a good thing, growth means a growing economy. However, is it sustainable?
At some point the land will run out in the valley with all of the mini-ranchettes taking up there own little half-acre. Problems of towns lacking a main center arise, instead strip shopping malls dot the suburbian sprawl with frustrated commuters because of poorly planned developments. You can't agrue this isn't happening, I see frustrated commuters whenever I get in my car and drive around Bozeman.
The land in the West has no way to control our growth, animals and habits can not vote and have no way to write congress. It is our responsibility as citizens to our greater community to protect what we value.
The question becomes, do you care enough about future generations and your fellow citizens to protect viewsheds? And more than that, do you want to protect the wildlife, habitats, and open land you were first drawn to this place by or do you want to give that up and just see ugly track homes and artificial lawns?
...from an MSU student who participated in "personal ethics"
However, in so doing, it is - in my opinion - not a wise thing to automatically erase from your mind, and your search for answers, options other than those afforded to us by gov.org.
Individualism should not be overlooked - in the West of all places! - and we should be extremely skeptical about melting into the masses, turning to any form of gov.org to preserve or protect. The Government has consistently illustrated how inept it is at land management of any kind, most particularly when compared to land management done by those who own, occupy and depend upon the land for their own means or purposes. Not every individual land owner has the same goal, the same means or the same purposes but that very difference is what makes our Nation so GREAT!!!
We should never be asked, by you or by any other person, to forfeit our right to own and use property in the USA. If wish to see, touch, experience the difference that inherent right makes for all of us you can sure witness the other alternatives in other countries around the world. Our forefathers protected this right with cause; they knew the value of it.
When you say " It is our responsibility as citizens to our greater community to protect what we value.", together with other wording within your message, you imply that "protection" must be done by the masses at the expense of the individual. Our forefathers also tried very hard to create an operation of gov.org to prevent a so-called popular vote from being able to take-away any right or property belonging to an individual person and it was their hope this would never happen in the USA.
I do not believe, Travis, that you could find a person who cares more for the land and the West or the creatures that inhabit it than I do. I have lived in Colorado my entire life and am a person of modest means. But - silly me! - when I started out waiting tables at the ripe old age of 14, coveting beautiful land near the CO Rockies and a good horse to ride across it, I did buy into The American Dream! And how nice it would be if you might consider such a Dream as the avenue to your ideals and goals also!
My American Dream encompassed the vision that if I would be willing to work hard / long 48-hour-days, continuing to try-harder each time I failed to meet a goal, that sooner or later I *could* realize any Dream I might have.
But there was no part of my Dream encompassing the idea that if I "wanted" I should "take" from my neighbor or anyone else. It was my Dream - and therefore my job! - to contribute to "our greater community" (as you put it) by providing for myself and my family and by giving great and prudent care to the land I loved: the land that I was very willing to sacrifice for in order to own.
So WHY, I have cause to wonder, does a thriving and excelling student at MSU who is participating in the study and examination of "personal ethics" fail to even recognize that the New West does not need to betray its pioneering spirit? Have you become so dependent upon gov.org that you have no faith in YOURSELF? If silly-old-me can work my fingers to the bone to BUY my open piece of God's country why can't you?
When time permits, I wish you would look at a map of the West and calculate the percentage of land NOW owned by The Public. Perhaps you would be amazed to see, comparatively speaking, how little land throughout the West is even owned by private parties!
The land in the West *does* have a way to control growth and growth *is* controlled - non-existent - on those enormous numbers of acres already totally owned and totally controlled by gov.org. If you are transplanted from the East perhaps you have not taken note of this fact?
A great many of the people who would just love like hell to take control of privately owned acres - including those acres that I bought and paid for with my own fingers and coins - could buy and sell me out of their pocket change.
So why is it that they don't BUY what they wish to control?
And why is it that your passion for the land in the West is not motivating YOU to work harder to buy your own corner of it? Have the youth of our nation gone so far downhill that they now *expect* gov.org, in one guise or the other, to provide every advantage FOR them? Is it the goal of MSU to teach you how to do just that? Or, is it simply absorption from the society in which we live that now gives you license for those expectations?
I suspect most who read New West are not natives of any part of it. But as a native of the Great State of Colorado I have known since I was a youngster and started finding beer cans and trash all over the magnificent acres within this State (left there when YOU came to visit??!???) that if I wanted to preserve and protect - or CONTROL - any part of it then I would need to work hard enough to make enough money to BUY it.
There are no walls around the State of Colorado or the New West in general. If you wish to control our population density and thereby control the demand and the need for all those homes and businesses that service those folks who wish to sink their roots within it, then you need to take a course in the History of China. To the best of my knowledge, they are a nation who addressed the question of population and the density of it successfully. After studying their means and methods then you will have food for thought about just how many of those policies you might like to instigate in the West!
If "The question becomes, do you care enough about future generations and your fellow citizens to protect viewsheds?" and your answer is YES, then I would suggest those who wish to protect viewsheds - OR wildlife OR habitats OR open land! - need to belly up to the bar and put their money where their mouth is.
Those who were "first drawn to this place" should take the time to study how those characteristics you learned to love have been historically "protected" prior to the time you arrived - and it sure as HELL was not created or maintained by any person who wanted to TAKE what belonged to a neighbor.
To find out who even tried that technique and to find out what happened to them you might want to visit one of the old cemeteries and read the headstones.
And I can only hope and pray
That if your plans are put in play
Those headstones will become more dense;
Those who TAKE will be past tense!
I'm reaching for a Kleenex now
While thinking you know only how
To have or fill your Dreams today
From buckets stolen without pay.
Look in a mirror and say: * I * CAN !!!
Why would you wish to be a man
Who only has a DREAM fulfilled
If someone else's blood is spilled?
"The superior man, when resting in safety, does not forget that danger may come.
When in a state of security he does not forget the possibility of ruin.
When all is orderly, he does not forget that disorder may come.
Thus his person is not endangered, and his States and all their clans are preserved."
Confucius (551 BC - 479 BC)
... and so it seems to me ...
Rose Mary