Ken (![[info]](http://l-stat.livejournal.com/img/userinfo.gif){kind=small} shadowplay2) wrote,@ 2006-07-12 19:27:00 |
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pathfinding
Most of today was spent out on one of my project sites, flagging access routes and work limits for habitat restoration work associated with a major infrastructure project. This is in federal endangered species habitat, so it needs to be done carefully, and I was having difficulty explaining what I needed from 2,000 miles away to the engineers on site, so it seemed more practical to just go out there and do it.
The early part was mostly awareness of the various nuisance factors, as I cut through the vines blocking entry from the nearby roadside. It wasn't hot today by midwestern summer standards, only upper 70s, but it was very humid after a few days of heavy rain. There weren't all that many mosquitos, but there were a few. The site is difficult to move through.
A second to explain that: This 200 something acre preserve has remnant good quality habitat areas, mostly sedge meadow and fen associated with cool seeps and springs. But it also has a long history of human abuse including 1880s mining. Much of the site, once very open, is now a thicket of buckthorn and honeysuckle with scattered large cottonwoods. It's very difficult to walk through the thicket, even see very far through it. I worked on this site in 1988, and remember all too well how long it took to move around. I'm probably one of only a few people who knows this place well. Parts of it have been cleared now, but not the part I'm currently looking at.
The second level was an appreciation of what the guys we usually pay to do this work have to endure. I'm out there for a day, getting complete respect from the guys on the construction side 200 meters away because I'm wearing one of those white management hardhats. There are people doing these manual labor things five days a week though, with not a lot of choice about what they do.
Then, level three was more of a frontier pathfinder mentality, thinking of how I'm covering a few hundred meters for one day but people did this for weeks and months to explore the wilderness. I'm using flagging tape instead of blazing trees, but same idea. This is where the mind began to become a little quieter.
As a side note, what I'd done is stop and get some basic garden loppers on the way down. it made for slow going clearing the path as I went, but it made the flagging easy to see, let me get a better look at the ground, and will speed the actual work when it happens. Today, I was covering about 150 meters for each hour. Not fast.
Level 4 was a sort of zen state, where the weather and the bugs no longer mattered, where time no longer mattered, where I heard the nearby traffic and the heavy cranes lifting formed concrete not far away, but let them pass through without distraction. I got some thinking done during this time too, without really trying too hard.
I've got a better idea now of what needs to happen, how we're going to get people in there. Once we can see a little better, when all those non-native shrubs are gone, then I need to walk a hydrologist and an engineer through and get a design pulled together to modify things, to divert stormwater which is causing a lot of the site disturbance, to allow the groundwater and seepage to function the way they should. In the morning I get to run this past various agency folks and my client, but finally things are ready to move forward. There's been to much planning the past few months, too much talking, here and in other parts of my life. It will be nice to have some action.
Most of today was spent out on one of my project sites, flagging access routes and work limits for habitat restoration work associated with a major infrastructure project. This is in federal endangered species habitat, so it needs to be done carefully, and I was having difficulty explaining what I needed from 2,000 miles away to the engineers on site, so it seemed more practical to just go out there and do it.
The early part was mostly awareness of the various nuisance factors, as I cut through the vines blocking entry from the nearby roadside. It wasn't hot today by midwestern summer standards, only upper 70s, but it was very humid after a few days of heavy rain. There weren't all that many mosquitos, but there were a few. The site is difficult to move through.
A second to explain that: This 200 something acre preserve has remnant good quality habitat areas, mostly sedge meadow and fen associated with cool seeps and springs. But it also has a long history of human abuse including 1880s mining. Much of the site, once very open, is now a thicket of buckthorn and honeysuckle with scattered large cottonwoods. It's very difficult to walk through the thicket, even see very far through it. I worked on this site in 1988, and remember all too well how long it took to move around. I'm probably one of only a few people who knows this place well. Parts of it have been cleared now, but not the part I'm currently looking at.
The second level was an appreciation of what the guys we usually pay to do this work have to endure. I'm out there for a day, getting complete respect from the guys on the construction side 200 meters away because I'm wearing one of those white management hardhats. There are people doing these manual labor things five days a week though, with not a lot of choice about what they do.
Then, level three was more of a frontier pathfinder mentality, thinking of how I'm covering a few hundred meters for one day but people did this for weeks and months to explore the wilderness. I'm using flagging tape instead of blazing trees, but same idea. This is where the mind began to become a little quieter.
As a side note, what I'd done is stop and get some basic garden loppers on the way down. it made for slow going clearing the path as I went, but it made the flagging easy to see, let me get a better look at the ground, and will speed the actual work when it happens. Today, I was covering about 150 meters for each hour. Not fast.
Level 4 was a sort of zen state, where the weather and the bugs no longer mattered, where time no longer mattered, where I heard the nearby traffic and the heavy cranes lifting formed concrete not far away, but let them pass through without distraction. I got some thinking done during this time too, without really trying too hard.
I've got a better idea now of what needs to happen, how we're going to get people in there. Once we can see a little better, when all those non-native shrubs are gone, then I need to walk a hydrologist and an engineer through and get a design pulled together to modify things, to divert stormwater which is causing a lot of the site disturbance, to allow the groundwater and seepage to function the way they should. In the morning I get to run this past various agency folks and my client, but finally things are ready to move forward. There's been to much planning the past few months, too much talking, here and in other parts of my life. It will be nice to have some action.
