IAT Gems

By Drew Hanson

A common question asked of me is, “What is your favorite part of the Ice Age Trail?” Wanting to remain as unbiased as possible, my response is often, “The next segment opened to the public.” It’s hard to beat a hike on any trail segments built by the Ice Age Trail Alliance's Mobile Skills Crew. With a half-dozen MSC projects each year, there are regularly new segments to enjoy.

But what about landscapes? What are some of the most special (and vulnerable) landscapes along the thousand-mile IAT? This is essentially the question the Ice Age Trail Alliance (then called the Ice Age Park and Trail Foundation) attempted to answer in the early-mid 1990s. What they came up with were a list of what they called gems. Although there are biases and omissions in the list, it does provide a partial index of exceptional natural resources of statewide and national significance along the IAT.

Here are the gems identified by IATA in 1994, listed from west to east:

* Dalles of the St. Croix
* Straight Lake
* Chippewa Moraine
* Old Baldy
* Wood Lake
* Grandfather Falls
* Harrison Hills
* Highland Lakes
* Eau Claire Dells
* New Hope Meltwater Channel
* Waupaca-Farmington Drumlins
* Lower Narrows
* Gibraltar Rock
* Lodi Marsh
* Table Bluff
* Cross Plains
* Verona Moraine
* Oconomowoc River
* Polk Kames

Obvious places like Devils Lake, Northern Kettle Moraine and Southern Kettle Moraine were left off presumably because they already had large blocks of public land, making them unthreatened by land use changes. Other places I would add to the list include the Keweenawan Hills, John Muir’s boyhood stomping grounds, Walla Hi and others.

It is a useful list to help answer the question of favorite places. More urgently, many of these resources remain vulnerable and it is hoped their mention here will refocus attention on their importance.

What are some of your favorites?

Enjoy Each Step

By Drew Hanson

Mindfulness is not something that comes easy to me. But it is something to which I am learning to strive, or stride, as I build an awareness of my breath and steps.

In his essay Walking Meditation, Thich Nhat Hanh writes, “Walking meditation is really to enjoy the walking—walking not in order to arrive, but just to walk. The purpose is to be in the present moment and, aware of our breathing and our walking, to enjoy each step. Therefore, we have to shake off all worries and anxieties, not thinking of the future, not thinking of the past, just enjoying the present moment.” Increasingly, this is how I try to walk (but rarely succeed).

While I am deeply grateful to Hanh for Peace Is Every Step, he argues that walking must be slow. When he states that running is a way to “print anxiety and sorrow on the Earth,” I think he is pointing a finger in the wrong direction. I agree that running through an airport is not meditative, but I also believe any form of walking, especially when done in nature, can be wonderful and beneficial. When it is done with intention and an awareness of one's breath and steps, regardless of pace, any form of walking can be meditative. As Hanh writes later in the same essay, “If you feel happy, peaceful, and joyful while you are walking, you are practicing correctly.”

Simply enjoy each step.

And breathe.

Sidewalks are for People

A major courier delivery services company wants to use wheeled robots instead of people to deliver packages. Groovy sci fi imagery aside, this is a really bad idea.

Sidewalks are for people. Will the wheeled robot step aside for a grandmother in a wheelchair or neighbor with MS who needs the full width of sidewalk? What will the robot wagon do when it tips over?

People have legal rights to sidewalks. Wheeled robots do not and should not. As urban landscapes continue to grow, sidewalks are one of the last refuges for millions of people to engage in humanity's oldest form of locomotion.

Instead of pouring gobs of money into robots, marketing and lobbying, a good company would do the right thing that is leaving sidewalks for people.

A Green New Deal

By Drew Hanson

We in the United States obsess too much over cutting taxes. The problem is not how much we spend, it is how we spend it.

It is not wasteful for our neighbor to have a living wage job, or to make our communities vibrant, or to ensure we have safe drinking water, or to keep our bridges from crumbling, or to head-off increased flooding.

At the height of the Great Depression, when most of the country was penny pinching out of dire necessity, the United States launched several New Deal programs that were the opposite of cost cutting. Opponents at the time said we could not afford them. But the Civilian Conservation Corp (better known as the CCC), the Works Progress Administration (WPA) and other progressive programs put millions of people to work investing in the future. They built public structures out of stone to last, painted amazing murals in buildings like post offices, created some of our favorite public parks, and much more.

A crowd-sourced, interactive map and database of New Deal projects is at https://livingnewdeal.org/ Check it out! Many of these projects created facilities that are among the most enduring and popular public works of the 20^th century. Many of them continue to be gifts from our grandparents that keep on giving.

Dells of the Eau Claire, one of six CCC project areas on the Ice Age Trail

Unfortunately, these far-sighted programs ended in World War II. A reshuffling of our nation’s priorities ensued. The selective obsessive cost cutting that followed turned into what our grandparents might these days call penny wise and pound foolish.

Today, while some of our roads, bridges, national parks and national scenic trails desperately need help, we lavish public dollars on sports stadiums and huge corporations like Foxconn and Amazon. What would our grandparents say? I think mine would say we’re being damn foolish.

America needs a New Deal for the 21^st century that creates the public infrastructure for the next 100 years. We need programs to address the backlog of projects on our national scenic trails such as having seasonal trail crews on the Ice Age Trail. Instead of more dams, long-distance transmission lines, and fossil fuel pipelines, we need investments in local renewable energy that do not alter the planet’s fisheries or climate. We need to reauthorize the Land and Water Conservation Fund. We need more sidewalks and bike lanes. We need to prevent invasive exotic species from over-running our lands, waters, and us. We need a Green New Deal.

Don't Spoil the Views

by Drew Hanson

An unneeded powerline that would mar a vast scenic area is planned for southwest Wisconsin. Known as the Cardinal-Hickory Creek high-voltage transmission line, it would connect Middleton with Iowa by way of a 100+ mile string of 150-foot tall towers.

Driftless Area

According to National Park Service geologist, Robert Rose, “The driftless area of Wisconsin is world famous because it is an unglaciated area of considerable size … lying far within extensively glaciated territory.” The Cardinal-Hickory Creek powerline would slice through the Driftless Area, from one end to the other.

One of the organizations opposing construction of the powerline is Driftless Defenders. According to their website, the powerline would cost ratepayers in excess of $500 million.

Blue Mounds

Native Americans called them Mu-cha-wa-ku-nin or Smokey Mountains. Today we call them Blue Mounds. Wisconsin’s first scientist, Increase Lapham, wrote that Blue Mounds, “were very important landmarks to guide the traveler in his course through the boundless prairies.” This includes 10,000 years of pedestrian use on the Ancient Trail that existed between the mouth of the Wisconsin River and mouth of the Milwaukee River.

Blue Mounds remain an inspirational landmark to users of the Ice Age Trail. Like a distant guidepost, Blue Mounds are visible from at least a dozen places on the Ice Age Trail in Dane, Columbia and Sauk counties. Click on the map at right. Some of the view points include the ridge above the Village of Cross Plains, 11 miles from Blue Mounds, and from 29 miles away on the Ice Age Trail at Sauk Point in Devils Lake State Park. Farther south, Blue Mounds is visible from part of the Montrose Segment of the Ice Age Trail as well. One could argue that these multiple view points make Blue Mounds the most important scenic feature of the entire thousand-mile Ice Age Trail.

Why deface views of such an historic and scenic feature?

Black Earth Valley

The proposed powerline would also degrade views of Black Earth Valley which is home to Black Earth Creek. The creek is a class 1 trout stream that is recognized as a premier trout destination and regionally significant resource. It has benefited from intensive habitat improvements. According to the DNR’s website, “The history here is deep, multi-layered and dynamic.”

Along the south rim of Black Earth Valley, at a future unit of the National Park System, are prairie and oak savanna remnants. Along the opposite valley rim are also prairie and oak savanna remnants on privately-owned land. Volunteers have worked for decades to restore these rare native plant communities. Standing among large old oak trees, the views from valley rim to valley rim are outstanding. The view would be junked by the huge Cardinal-Hickory Creek powerline.

Not Needed

The future of energy is in conservation and local renewables.

According to a recent report by the Wisconsin Public Service Commission, slow growth in electricity use is anticipated, with peak demand expected to increase just 0.5 percent a year through 2024. Such a small increase in demand can be met through energy conservation measures and modest investments in local renewables such as solar.

According to the U.S. Energy Information Administration’s website, the share of U.S. total utility-scale electricity generation from nonhydropower renewables is expected to increase by almost a full percentage point each of the next two years.

Dane County is leading the way. A massive solar energy site is planned for the Dane County Regional Airport. It would be the largest solar energy project in south-central Wisconsin and the second largest in Wisconsin. Coupled with other conservation and local renewables projects, it means we don’t need to spend $500+ million for a new huge powerline to bring power from elsewhere.

So enough with the Cardinal-Hickory Creek powerline idea. It is not needed and would deface treasured natural resources.

You can view the Draft Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS) here.

You can email comments on the DEIS to comments@CardinalHickoryCreekEIS.us

If you need help with your comments, see here.