The 1929 Maricopa County Courthouse and Phoenix City Hall when it was surrounded by shade trees and manicured lawns (Photographer unknown).
Alone among the cities of the American Southwest, Phoenix is the oasis. It has always been so, but whether it remains an oasis city is starting to come into doubt. A common narrative is that Phoenix attracted Midwesterners who wanted to recreate the landscape from which they came.
This is untrue. In fact, the early Anglo residents were from many regions, especially the South. And the oasis predates American settlement. The archeology of the region is in flux, but it appears that "plant husbandry" was being performed by prehistoric tribes as early as 3,000 or 1,500 B.C. (or BCE if you are trapped in the politically correct precincts of academia). By the first millennium A.D., the most advanced irrigation in the New World was being perfected by the Hohokam.
The Salt River Valley was an ideal location, with rich alluvial soil that would grow anything — just add water. The altitude and weather in the modern climate era allow for two or more growing seasons depending on the crop. Maize was imported from Mesoamerica. Cottonwoods, willows and other native shade trees grew along the riverbank and its subsidiary creeks. I have no doubt that Hohokam dwellings were well-shaded. The new settlers merely took it to a higher level.
The photo above captures the oasis city at its zenith, in the 1960s. Note the inviting public space provided by shade and grass surrounding an inspiring art deco building. This was the Phoenix I grew up in. At 10,000 feet, you would have seen a green city surrounded by bands of citrus groves, farm fields and horse pastures. And then: The majestic, largely untrammeled Sonoran Desert. What a place to live. The older neighborhoods were graced by mature trees and parking lawns, a grassy area between the curb and sidewalk. Encanto Park was an oasis within an oasis. Central, as you see below, was lined with palm trees. North of Camelback were shady acreages, often along streets with an abundant shade canopy, set back behind irrigation "laterals." My great aunt lived in one: It was a wonder of shade and tranquility behind oleander hedges on Seventh Avenue. Well into her eighties, this daughter of the frontier would walk out every Sunday evening to turn the valve and "take her water," the flood irrigation from the Salt River Project.
In our neighborhood, what is now Willo, few families had pools but most put in winter lawns to give the sweet season its magical green. Even driveways had grass between two narrow concrete strips. This was not the Midwest. It wasn't LA, although the parking lawns were imported from there. Instead, Phoenix created its own unique urban aesthetic. It wasn't planned. This Eden just happened. If you missed it, you have my deepest sympathy. Many areas of oasis beauty remain. If you want a sense of the practical benefit, drive south from Osborn on Fifteenth Avenue some summer evening with the windows down. When you cross Thomas into Encanto Park, the temperature will drop by ten degrees or more.
Grapes planted with Camelback Mountain in the distance. Agriculture separated most of the city from the desert (Photographer unknown).
Phoenix had the water that El Paso and Tucson lacked. After the Newlands Act resulted in the construction of Theodore Roosevelt Dam in the early 20th century, followed by more dams, water from the capricious Salt and Verde rivers was available for the Salt River Valley. Almost every imaginable crop was planted, although by 1960 cotton, citrus and alfalfa took most of the farmland.
Other delights abounded, from horses wandering across empty meadows to date farms. Trees had lined many of the major canals for decades. More than 600,000 acres were under cultivation at the peak. Cheap, dependable water also allowed for the building of a garden city. This continued well into the later years of the century. The acreages gave way to housing, but the huge trees were preserved where possible, making North Central one of the most desirable neighborhoods. Similarly, Henry Coerver and other developers of Arcadia in the '50s and '60s kept many citrus and other trees as they built that district's distinctive big ranch houses on lush properties. Even John F. Long preserved many trees that once sat beside ditches and canals when he built Maryvale. Some are still there.
Mistakes began in the 1970s, such as the frying pan in front of Symphony Hall and the unsightly Patriot's Square. But the abundance and care most places were amazing. Apartments along the Moreland and Portland parkways, around Sixth Avenue north of Osborn — all over the city, really — were lavishly landscaped. My mother kept several gardens around our modest lot; most people did. It was a city of flowers. Nurseries were big business.
My first paying job, my freshman year of high school, was working landscaping for Bill Schultz's new apartments in south Scottsdale. These moderately priced buildings were surrounded by flower beds, bushes and saplings, kept immaculately. I must confess, after painting scores of tree stakes avocado green, I suffer a lifelong hatred of the color. But the results were splendid and over the years I drove past and watched those trees grow. Planting shade trees and other landscaping were a given, not just for residences but for offices and government buildings. One of my first memories of Union Station wasn't just the trains, but the well-kept flower beds, hedges and palm trees. The roadways into Sky Harbor were similarly beautiful. Most schools were lush with shade trees and grass. North High was especially beautiful.
To be sure, the desert was always there, just outside the footprint of the SRP. Kids from Sunnyslope were genuine desert rats, not children of the oasis like me. The neighborhood that still stands just north of Oak Street and the Papago Buttes is another unique and pleasing desert environment. Paradise Valley, much less dense than today, offered the same for the swells. Saguaros grow naturally on hillsides. But it was always remarkable to drive south back into the Salt River Project, say as 44th Street crossed the Arizona Canal. One was back in the oasis. Back home.
Have a look (click on the photo for a larger image):
The famed Japanese Flower Gardens that ran for miles along Baseline Road (Photographer unknown).
Central Avenue and McDowell Road in the early 1950s (Photographer unknown).
The Encanto Park lagoon (Photographer unknown).
Even this car dealership at Fifth Street and McDowell Road showed the oasis aesthetic that prevailed, with grass and landscaping (Brad Hall collection).
A shady, cool home on Palm Lane (Photographer unknown).
And another in the historic districts (Photographer unknown).
Our home in Willo, the A.C. Redewill House after a rainstorm (Susan Talton photo).
The house I grew up in two blocks away, setting for David and Lindsey's home in the Mapstone Mysteries (Photographer unknown).
East Monroe Street in 1937, lined with palm trees and grass (McCulloch Bros. Collection/ASU Archives).
Looking northeast across the Phoenix Country Club in the 1950s (Photographer unknown).
Phoenix circa 2010. The desert gives way to the oasis (Photographer unknown).
The oasis ethic was lost somewhere in the 1990s, somewhere in 40 percent population growth and people throwing down gravel with a smug, "we live in the desert!" When I returned to buy a house in Willo, it was common to see parking lawns covered with rocks. The beautiful composition was destroyed.
Or to see entire yards gone gravel with a few pitiful plants trying to survive the radiated heat. "Lawns" of cactus showed up. All this was ahistorical and bad for the heat island. It looked like hell. In a few places, people had done serious and attractive xeriscaping, perhaps not knowing this could take as much or more water as a lawn. In any event, it didn't belong in the historic district.
City government was an especially bad actor, throwing down rocks everywhere from fire stations to the Hope VI project that replaced the shady Henson Homes. And what seems like thousands of shadeless palo verde trees. The beautiful park surrounding the old city-county building was vandalized with palo verdes and dirt. At the Pioneer Cemetery, grass was killed; only uninviting dirt remains. Sky Harbor is a particularly hideous mess of concrete and rocks. Most schools have paved their grass for parking lots or gone "desert," e.g. gravel.
A few victories were scored. For example, the pocket park at Third Avenue and Holly that we called Paperboy's Island (the Republic and Gazette were deposited there for paperboys to fold and deliver) was kept green and flower beds were added. Encanto Park remained green, and an attempt was made to do the same with the deck park and Steele Indian School Park. The park at Arizona Center is a marvel of oasis landscaping that should be a model. But the destruction continued. Changing the curb at the Viad Tower for light rail (WBIYB) led the building management to turn what had been a lovely sanctuary of shade and plants into a hostile "desert" plot. Scores of Encanto Park's mature trees were lost in a freak storm. Most of the mid-century apartments have gone rocks, along with adding those enticing prison doors. Union Station didn't just lose its trains, but its landscaping.
All over central Phoenix are abandoned palm trees, left to die, looking like giant burnt match sticks. Another kick in the gut: Most of North High School's luxuriant campus was replaced by parking lots (lost, too, were the handsome tile roofs on the buildings). Perhaps the greatest crime was the thoughtless annihilation of the Japanese Flower Gardens, replaced by faux Spanish-Tuscan suburban crapola apartments and shopping strips. No wonder summers are hotter and lasting longer, even without global climate change.
The oasis was planted with such intensity and on such a scale, the growth of living things coming so naturally in this valley, that much good remains. This is especially true in areas with money, such as North Central and Arcadia. But I dread what will happen as water becomes more expensive. As the appetite of the Real Estate Industrial Complex demands that central Phoenix go "desert" so that yet more tract houses can be stamped out in "Superstition Vistas" and Buckeye. It has already destroyed nearly all of the priceless citrus groves in the metropolitan area. People don't even remember what was lost, or why it mattered. Why it made this place magic. Special. They tend to be the same people who ask why I "hate Phoenix" and write so many "negative columns."
A mature ficus tree consecrates the space between the ordinary, sideways-aligned skyscrapers at Lexington and Central. It is worth more than all the palo verdes lining the avenue, more than all the rocks, asphalt and concrete spread across 1,500 miles of urban footprint. It is a water investment more valuable than new golf courses or artificial lakes. But I don't see shade trees being planted for the future, certainly not on the scale needed (and a host of drought-tolerant trees are available, and some relative water-suckers are still worth it). I don't see either city leadership or an understanding among the populace — even smart people — of what is at stake.
The oasis was never meant to encompass subdivisions, big boxes and freeways from west of the White Tanks to east of Superstition. The Salt River Valley and environs can't sustain 4 million people in these living arrangements, even if we let all of the historic districts go to dirt. But the whole notion of "we're living in a desert" as justification for destroying the oasis is madness. Oases are part of the desert. What was created in Phoenix is a unique thing of beauty and way of living with the desert.
We should have many conversations: Designing houses without so much concrete and more along the lines of what is seen in Spain (or in the old barrios of central Tucson) rather than the sun-blasted, heat-radiating, cookie-cutter "product" seen now. Artificial lakes are problematic. In many areas, real desert landscaping (one doesn't see lawns of rocks in the natural desert) could also provide beauty and shade. Natural dirt is almost always preferable to gravel. Fewer parking lagoons. But destroying the old oasis is not the answer. Doing so will cut the heart and soul out of Phoenix. A key priority must be conserving and replenishing it.
My book, A Brief History of Phoenix, is available to buy or order at your local independent bookstore, or from Amazon.
Read more Phoenix history in Rogue's Phoenix 101 archive.
Brings me to tears.
Sent off to about 30 folks I know.
Thanks Jon.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 03, 2013 at 07:03 PM
I remember my silly old dad, back in the fifties, declaring that land without irrigation (e.g. Scottsdale and Shea)would never be worth anything, never realizing that plenty of slickies were at that very moment conniving and greasing palms to sucker the taxpayers into paying for the infrastructure to make it worth plenty. He still thought, even then, that Sunny slope was a TB colony. Sometimes I run into people from old Phoenix (I haven't been back in twenty years, don't want to see it)and it's fun to get nostalgic, Wallace and Ladmo, cruising Central, orange blossoms, and so on. Hell, it's impossible not to get nostalgic.
Posted by: Pat | September 04, 2013 at 08:50 AM
I sold doughnuts to the Tubercular at the Walbash Trailer court in 1950,51,52, and 53. On out Cavecreek road was a bait shop about where the Hiking Shack used to be. And a few miles further near Lone Mountain was the Shangri La Nude ranch.
It still exists now in New River.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 04, 2013 at 08:57 AM
Nice one Rogue! You've done 'membered (like the kids say in Beyond Thunderdome). I grew up in the neighborhood just north of the Papago Buttes. It was unique. We'll keep the lights on...
"Time counts and keeps countin', and we knows now finding the trick of what's been and lost ain't no easy ride. But that's our trek, we gotta' travel it. And there ain't nobody knows where it's gonna' lead. Still in all, every night we does the tell, so that we 'member who we was and where we came from... but most of all we 'members the man that finded us, him that came the salvage. And we lights the city, not just for him, but for all of them that are still out there. 'Cause we knows there come a night, when they sees the distant light, and they'll be comin' home."
Posted by: eclecticdog | September 04, 2013 at 09:35 AM
We lived a couple of houses down from the Hansons of Hanson's Mortuary fame. Their son was thrown out of NAU for getting drunk and wrecking his car.
All that drama and the smell of citrus blossoms to boot!
In all seriousness, I felt like the luckiest kid in the world to have landed in Phoenix, AZ in 1957, from the burbs of Babylon, NY.
Posted by: headless | September 04, 2013 at 09:38 AM
Appreciate the pix,but came across this item by accident on Azcentral website.Shows az. incomes 20% below national incomes-not one word from Republic's columnists.go to
http://www.azcentral.com/business/buzz/articles/20130823arizonans-earnings-hit-new-low.html
Posted by: [email protected] | September 04, 2013 at 02:38 PM
cal,
you sold donuts at a nude ranch??
I'm afraid to ask, "how did you hold the donuts when you made change?????"
Concerned in Mesa
Posted by: AzReb R. Perez | September 04, 2013 at 03:06 PM
More cheerleading from Elliot Pollack-go to
http://www.kjzz.org/content/1309/solutions-dealing-high-state-unemployment
Az.is right on schedule to return to the good ol' days-if you don't eat in 2014.
Posted by: [email protected] | September 04, 2013 at 03:06 PM
Side note: new reply to "headless" in the previous thread.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 04:03 PM
I'd like to discuss the dynamics behind this trend. As of 2010:
"Phoenix consumes the same amount of water now as it did 10 years ago despite adding roughly 400,000 residents."
Yet, water in Phoenix is still comparatively cheap and we use a lot of it: "A family of four using 100 gallons per person each day will pay on average $34.29 a month in Phoenix compared to $65.47 for the same amount in Boston."
Note that urban declines in per capita water usage are a strong trend in many municipalities, not just Phoenix.
Also note that in places like Las Vegas, "Most of the infrastructure is paid for by new customers...There’s not a lot of infrastructure dollars in the water rate."
Unlike Las Vegas' water, Phoenix's supply benefits from federal and state tax subsidies, so I'm not sure to what extent Phoenix's water infrastructure depends on a Las Vegas style ponzi-scheme. But in any case, when infrastructure is built into water rates those rates become more expensive. That may be an additional reason why water rates in Phoenix are comparatively cheap.
http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2010/world/the-price-of-water-a-comparison-of-water-rates-usage-in-30-u-s-cities/
Unfortunately, the imbedded links (some of which look promising) in this article don't seem to work.
What I want to know is to what extent water prices (both residential and non-agricultural business rates) have changed since the 1960s. (Obviously, these have to be adjusted for inflation, otherwise they'll just mislead with illusory increases.)
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 04:32 PM
P.S. When I asked about historical water rates, I meant Phoenix specifically. I want to figure out the extent to which price changes have been driving the defoliating trend, and the extent to which other factors are influencing this.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 04:38 PM
Sorry: the reply to "headless" was in the "The Dam Problem" thread not the previous thread (Friday Saloon). It's short enough to post here (and relevant since we're still discussing water):
The task (political reformation of wasteful agricultural water use) is made easier by the fact that while some agricultural users of water are indeed a powerful lobby, they are also a minority; and there are competing powerful interests.
If passing (and enforcing) regulations and taxes against the immediate interests of any powerful group was impossible, then the Wall Street Journal editorial page wouldn't constantly be complaining about intrusive government "stifling initiative" with regulations and taxes.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 04:48 PM
Here's one link that worked: the survey data (30 municipalities) on water usage and costs (2010, but see footnotes also):
http://www.circleofblue.org/waternews/2010/world/the-price-of-water-a-comparison-of-water-rates-usage-in-30-u-s-cities/
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 05:06 PM
Did you know that your drinking water costs may subsidize golf courses?
* * *
The golf building boom in the 1990s was fueled by Wall Street speculation that made assumptions about golf based on resort trends, but the costs of operating a course have long been enormous.
Southern Arizona courses were encouraged to use treated effluent known as reclaimed water to irrigate their greens as early as the 1980s.
Some courses got specially negotiated rates, but the standard rate has risen about 40 percent over the past 10 years.
That's despite a yearly subsidy from potable-water customers that in the past decade has ranged from 3 to 28 percent of the cost of providing the reclaimed water.
The proposed subsidy for the fiscal year beginning in July amounts to more than $2.2 million, or 19 percent of the service's cost, Tucson Water officials said.
http://azstarnet.com/business/local/new-golf-courses-unlikely-in-southern-arizona-as-costs-rise/article_6d1dc06d-d89c-52bd-bae8-2df75eb470b8.html
* * *
I'm not sure how different Phoenix (or Scottsdale) is from Tucson in this regard. A rise in effluent costs of this magnitude over 10 years is interesting but still doesn't answer my question about general residential and non-agricultural business costs for potable water; and it may be that effluent costs more than it did because more businesses are using it to cut costs (it's still cheaper than potable water) than 10 years ago.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 04, 2013 at 05:24 PM
There are 3 kinds of lies. Lies, damn lies and statistics.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 04, 2013 at 10:04 PM
Jon, Maybe a 50's piece on Phoenix Fight Clubs (and dance clubs), like Ciots Ballroom, Riverside and Sarges Cowtown. Or the empty lot at the rear of McDonalds where at 19 I had my last stupid macho hand to hands combat. The Globe,AZ born actor Jack Elam lost an eye at a fight at Ciots.
And U can toss in some stuff about Bobs, The zombie and Jerry's drive in restaurants.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 05, 2013 at 09:42 AM
Emil: Good answer. Thanks.
I guess my real objection has less to do with your suggestion (which makes sense) but with the necessity (politically) of being forced to pit powerful interests against one another in their little pissing contests for perceived self-interest instead of being able to address the common interests of the populace at large in a straightforward and meaningful way.
If the progressive left were more forthcoming and clear about their actual goals, the game of immediate political manipulation might suffer, but the metagame of capturing the minds of the credulous who always respond to the emotional blandishments of the right would eventually take a shellacking.
Posted by: headless | September 05, 2013 at 10:45 AM
I was addressing the common interests of the populace at large in a straightforward way: water conservation will become more important if shortages of freshwater supplying Arizona occur more frequently, whether as a result of climate change, regional population growth, or both.
Since roughly 80 percent of Arizona's water use is agricultural (more in New Mexico), and many ranchers and farmers use water wastefully rather than invest private capital in efficient irrigation systems (simply because they can, because their water is cheap), serious water management plans need to consider ways to goose agricultural water users into switching to drip irrigation and other water-efficient systems.
In subsequently noting that agricultural water interests, while powerful, are a minority, as well as opposed by other powerful interests, I was merely addressing your claim that political reform of water policy is "naive" because powerful interests are involved.
Instead of arguing on the basis of vague general principles, it's important to realize that the achievability of specific political goals depends upon the concrete details of actual circumstances.
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 05, 2013 at 03:35 PM
Incidentally, the best estimates of agricultural water use rely on direct surveys of farmers and ranchers. Since Arizona's total annual water allocation is known, the water use of remaining sectors (domestic, commercial, industrial, and environmental) can be determined by simple subtraction. Of course, there is an intermediate step that consists of extrapolating from a sample to statewide estimates, but if the sample size is large and the study is well designed, this is about as reliable as any such estimates can be.
http://www.climas.arizona.edu/book/export/html/1159
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 05, 2013 at 03:45 PM
Cal, years ago I enjoyed a brief, breezy book called How To Lie With Statistics.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/How_to_Lie_with_Statistics
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 05, 2013 at 03:53 PM
Emil: "... I was merely addressing your claim that political reform of water policy is "naive" because powerful interests are involved."
I was not saying that reform of water policy is naïve. I was saying that your reliance upon jiggering existing rules to compel farmers or other special interests to behave differently is ultimately naïve because you are pursuing a sub rosa policy agenda (re water or downtown housing for the poor)that has no policy substance other than yours or some other politically astute persons realization that they can bend the political forces to behave in a way that ultimately benefits themselves and everyone else - but without anyone really understanding why - except you and your fellow puppeteers.
This, in my view, is caving to the rights policy of manipulating rather than enlightening.
I don't think that you believe that the powerful interests OR the voting public can be made to understand the stakes in this thing.
Posted by: headless | September 05, 2013 at 06:43 PM
Emil: "Instead of arguing on the basis of vague general principles, it's important to realize that the achievability of specific political goals depends upon the concrete details of actual circumstances."
I would counter that argument with the historical fact that persons extremely astute in the realm of actual 'facts' can be led astray by their underlying belief in a juvenile politico/economic philosophy, creating a lot of damage in the process.
Allan Greenspan comes to mind. I'm sure you can come up with many examples yourself. You can even quantify them if you like.
Posted by: headless | September 05, 2013 at 07:07 PM
The powerful have had the same philosophy since they started piling up the spoils in their caves
Posted by: cal Lash | September 05, 2013 at 07:25 PM
Here was one of Arizonas first Kooks.
Ralph Cameron
Posted by: cal Lash | September 05, 2013 at 09:00 PM
Ken Burns National Parks. Why would one want to live in a mega city, Ratsville.
From
Loneman on the edge of the Grand Canyon and the beauty of Zion.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 05, 2013 at 10:00 PM
Quit trying to save the universe with factoids. Pick up a thigh bone and become Atilla. Watch the movie Night Moves. Do something besides try and logic the worlds problems. Get off your puter and visit the real world.
I know and do work for Arizona farmers. They say screw drip irrigation but I think in ten years they will come around.
Posted by: cal Lash | September 05, 2013 at 10:25 PM
Cal:
Does the Talton fan club ever meet over drinks rather than coffee? If so, I'm in. I'll even buy the first five rounds.
Chris
Posted by: Chris Thomas | September 06, 2013 at 07:04 PM
You are correct, "headless". The seemingly straightforward and transparent public policy reforms I have suggested (e.g., water conservation, affordable housing, urban revitalization) are actually window-dressing for the political cabal of which I am a trusted agent; a cabal whose sub-rosa agenda cannot possibly be understood by the sniveling untermenschen (which includes you, your family and friends, and everyone who can be associated with the actor Kevin Bacon using five or fewer links).
It is curious that, without being a party to the conspiracy or to the ulterior motives of its secret actors, you are nonetheless able to assert their existence with perfect certainty. This "fuzzy logic" ability you possess makes you an intolerable risk to the seizure of power we are so meticulously plotting.
Given the resources of our organization, it was child's play to hack into the blog software, read the computer IP address imbedded in your comments' envelope data, and, using the contacts we have cultivated at the ISPs, to determine your real name and physical location. Puppeteers (the quaint but descriptive term is yours) have already been dispatched to "remove the obstacle" -- look up in the sky and you will see the chem-trails!
A simple software script ensures that only you can read this. Everyone else will see only an innocuous comment written in the slightly wonky style I have created for my "Emil Pulsifer" persona; a soporific bromide on the subject of agricultural subsidies. The reply which you (and you alone) are reading will be automatically deleted in 30 seconds.
I am genuinely sorry it has come to this: your uniquely intuitive perception would be an asset to our organization; but the Vanguard requires discipline, discretion, and obedience to the hierarchy; and lacking these traits, you cannot be subverted.
And so, it's the chem-trails for you, my dear. It is best to inhale deeply, to avoid lingering unpleasantness.
Auf Wiedersehen,
Dr. Gnomon
P.S. "Bwaaahahahaha!!" (tm 2013 Dr. Gnomon, all rights reserved)
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 08, 2013 at 02:36 PM
Thank you, Mr. Pulsifer, for that final, carefully reasoned argument on the role of tax policy modifications in water conservation. Your conclusions are very similar to those reached in our 2010 white-paper, "Resource Stewardship and Market Cost/Pricing Incentives".
Kent Whittaker
The Green Institute
Posted by: Kent Whittaker | September 08, 2013 at 02:41 PM
Seriously though, "headless", it seems that you have nothing to say on the subject of water conservation (or for that matter, realpolitik).
You cannot specify a sub-rosa agenda because none exists (and if it did you would not be party to it). You cannot explain what is "juvenile" about attempts to change behavior through incentives passed by the legislative (or executive) branches of state power in the specific case(s) in question.
All you can do is smear your opponent in frustration, make unsubstantiated, inapplicable, and intellectually lazy generalizations, and offer inappropriate comparisons. (Regarding the latter, is everyone who suggests changing incentives through political action comparable to Alan Greenspan?)
Posted by: Emil Pulsifer | September 08, 2013 at 03:02 PM
Did someone say drinks?
Posted by: Petro | September 09, 2013 at 07:11 AM
When you first come up the Viad Building, you do see the desert landscaping...but walk further onto the property ..and their IS an oasis... my favorite spot in Ph-oe-nix. Originally planned as two towers, but the second one never built, but they HAD already dug the hole for the foundations. Hidden below ground level and the bell and horn of the light rail, are fountains, hardscape cliffs with cascading water,grass thick and lush everywhere, and a group of kids running across said grass down by where the cascades of water pond..the children are bronze, so forever frocking ..at the top, ground level is a photographer, capturing the moment foreve. Up on ground level behibd all this grass, are trees, complete with a retiree falling asleep in a lawn chair reading the paper that has since fallen, also bronze, and the lady with kerchief on her head, planting seasonal flowers at the base of a lamp post...wandering back to the desert and cacti area, is the window washer forever cleaning the same spot, captured in, you guess it, bronze. A truly magical and enchanting place.
Posted by: Marti McVey | August 15, 2024 at 04:10 PM