I have convinced all my relatives to no longer contribute to the nature conservancy, sierra club etc. They seem to be in numerous shady land deals to then sell to the government land next to parks in exchange for other properties to landlock development corridors and label them corridors for endangered species. I kid you not, my property is listed as a bee migration corridor due to the plants on it. It also has tiger salamander habitat as well.
Around here, these guys do a lot of suing and buying up development rights surrounding cities, driving up the cost of development. This has good and badd effects. It forces multiple level housing in once empty lots (obviously former farming ground of what was probably the top 10% fertile soil in the world) with business on the ground floor next to trains. It then sells these places for roughly the same cost as a house of similar square footage, if not more. Te tax base from these projects are much more amneable to paying unfunded liabilities of government employees, which keeps expanding, because they never contract, soma development spiral is necessary wi massive coordination needed, which most small business people cant even begin to comprehend. We of course need legal and illegal immigration to drive demand for this infrastructure, which, socially, is homogeneous to depend upon government. All of this development is intertwined to feed itself, i cant remember when a static population or even less increase was even discussed in liberal circles since i was a liberal until 10 years ago.
Good and bad with all this development. To me, the bad part of public transit out here was it started good with train in between business, but then the car era took over, the tracks were ripped up, and housing developed around what track was left, and then when silicon valley hit, the chance to have rail be effective was over, and now, costs to put it in is being wasted on a bullet train from nowhere to nowhere.
A great book on infratructure is one by buckminsterfuller. He envisioned better portable housing which would allow flexibility to redesign cities as needs changed. We started with house with basements, and then foundations so a static house has been codified into the american psyche.
A great book to read about electricity development is called "powerplay" by sharon beder. She offers interesting history and government solutions but is short on other solutions. Essentially, the private power people were essentially the government, and innovation slowed. It will be interesting if fuel cells will ever deliver as well as cheaper solar. The government and industry want people on the grid, which to me is a part of the problem.
. Organize, you will want to bargain for maintenance of benefits. /color]
