I recently drove by the State Police Barracks in Monroe and was “treated” to a view which symbolizes the state of our locale.
In front of me loomed the great wall of Nininger Road and what best can be described an ugly instant urban view. The new construction of multi-floor apartment buildings are massed together with little or no room between them.
The area has been clear cut of trees, devoid of any natural beauty and completely out of touch with the rural nature of our community.
Change is natural and needed for a society to prosper and develop. However, society, in my view, needs to combine growth with grace and intelligent planning which does not strip the environment, abuse resources and pose excessive problems to neighbors and neighboring communities.
This enormous and I submit outrageous construction flaunts good stewardship of our locale. Water, sewerage,traffic flow, infrastructure,air quality and, yes, beauty are all casualties of a building abomination in our midst.
Recent developments and compromises can be debated but the gist of the dilemma is that at the enormous rate of this new construction the area we reside in will be and is being transformed into an overcrowded and density condition which cannot be accommodated.
It is truly unfortunate that our local and county officials have chosen to ignore intelligent growth planning, resource management, tax consequences and simple logic.
There is a thing called the statute of limitations. Our locale cannot continue to utilize water, expel sewerage, isolate social groups, over use roadways and still progress.
We have a recipe for disaster which we know every urban center has gone through in history. Overcrowded conditions have consequences not the least of which is disease, air and water pollution to name a few.
Projecting into the future leads one to see that the Monroe-Chester area will soon lose its rural suburban nature and will be transformed into the very place many of us departed from.
The fault is not in our stars but it is in poor town, village and county officials who have ignored their responsibilities and have allowed one group to manipulate our polity.
That is the state of our locale.
Stephen Zecher
Monroe