> > > > > However, the worst offenders are developers who bulldoze and burn forests near growing cities. Subdivisions and shopping centers are spreading out from Atlanta like a mushroom cloud. It's also true of many other cities that I visit on a regular basis. Nashville, Knoxville, and Murfreesboro in Tennessee are good examples. I saw two aerial photos of Murfreesboro made in 1955 and 1995. It was unbelieveable how much forest was gone, not to mention farmland that was covered with houses. > Wow! You make me want to start reading science fiction again after 25 years. As for the oxygen produced by plankton in the ocean; sure, we can breath that. As long as it's a two atom molecule, it's ok. That might be a good reason to stop polluting the ocean.
> >
> > As far a population increasing in concerned, there are things we could do about that. However, I don't know that I agree with any of them. After you are around 50 or 60 years, you begin to realize just how fast the population is increasing. No only that, the rate of increase is increasing. I can remember when you could find a place to park. When you could turn left at a light with no arrow. I can remember when red lights didn't have arrows, even in cities. I can remember when people could walk to work quickly and safely. I remember when cites were connected by two-lane highways and airliners had propellers.
> > I remember when the doctor's office was in an old house or a room over the drug store. I remember when schools had one room for each grade. I remember when each town had one bank, one post office, one drug store, two gas stations and three churches and it was enough. I remember when a town of 8000 had 300 phones and it was enough. I remember when you had to drive out into the country before getting to the next town. I remember walking all over town. Then I got a bicycle and rode all over town and nobody ran over me. I remember when everybody's parents grew up on a farm and their grandparents still lived there.
> > But the population of the country, and of the world, has doubled a couple of times since then and we don't have as much room in the more comfortable parts of the planet anymore. We may have to spread out into the jungles, the deserts, and the snowfields.
> > Howard
>
> You're living in the wrong city then Howard. In my town, there are no stoplights, very little crime, and you can walk anywhere safely at 2:00 in the morning or 2:00 in the afternoon. We only have one gas station, everyone has the same phone prefix, and there are only 2 church houses. And the only parking worries we have are the laws saying you can't part next to a building...you have to be 30 feet away. The closest town is a 45 minute drive, with a mountain seperating us from them.
>
> Move out here if you think the poplulation is growing to fast. It might make you change your mind...
> Then again, maybe everyone who's gotten sick of small town life has just up and moved to your city...and that's why this town keeps getting smaller, and you can't find a parking space...
>
> Ti'Naw, that couldn't be it'cia

Utah, right?
Actually, I live in (near) Lenoir City, a town of less than 7000, but it is about to be swallowed by Knoxville, our nearby "big city." I guess the point I was trying to make is that within my life time the population increase is very obvious. Small towns were everywhere back then, but now they have grown into cites or become part of a megalopolis. Thankfully, there are still small towns around, some of them, like yours, are isolated from big population centers. Skagway, Alaska is one that appealed to me. I also like those little coastal towns in Maine and places like Key West.I kinda miss the good old days. Well...sometimes.
Howard