Understanding urban wilds and the need for public input

Signal Hill. A few hundred hectares at the edge of a city that boomed while others, like New York were mudholes, to paraphrase one friend. Its flanks have been traipsed upon my French and English garrisons. D'Iberville and Marconi amongst a million others have left their footprints.

It's crowded with history yet one can wander for hours amongst a groundcover of rhodera and crowberry, languish in summer heat under branches of white birch and spruce, watch a hawk cruise a wetland, taste wild berries, be dazzled by vertiginous cliffs. Feel gloriously Away.

But someone wants to implant an order on this marvellous disorder of decades. Someone has decided that this, after all, is not wild and therefore should be gentrified, citified, urbanized. Children, parents, neighbours, residents, taxpayers, visitors have no say in this. Those who have for years scoured the warren-like maze of paths on the hills, who know this place has history, even a little wild grace, now have no say in the new 'interpretation' of this site.

Now we will have a theme park. Now we will be told about the ground cover, the trees and shrubs, the berries (brought over from the old country), the rocks. Appropriate signs to guide our thoughts and dull our curiosity, "As far as I know, no one has ever been inspired by an interpretation park to write great literature," opines one of our great writers, Susan Rendell about this development.

I thought that such attitudes had vanished years ago. That merchant-class 'what's best for you' tone gone the way of the dodo. The great auk. Apparently not. It thrives in St. John's. Still. Has hushed our City Council. We hear diddly-squat from them on how this came to be - no plans, no approval, no permits. Nada.

And we must be grateful.

Somehow, this doesn't quite sit in 2006.

Yes, this is about two things. One. We have a wild urban space. Meaning, it's wild, not untouched but now it's part of a reclaimed space. And for years a part of a space for children and adults to play, discover, find both physical and spiritual solace away the noisy, hard-surfaced everyday hubbub of the city. And, you can bet your life on it - there's valuable wetlands and creatures and plants, too. And two, people should have a say about how this land is used. We should all have a say. This is crown, public land, not private land. But Crown land - and - to boot - adjacent to a National Historic Site.

Who is the Johnson Family Foundation to decide that these lands are not significant enough to protect? Or that their brand of conservation is suitable in this instance?

We must accept that sometimes, the best stewardship simply means letting things be. Rather than create equal access to peoples of different mobilities the integrity of certain places, like the fen, would be best served by allowing no-one to enter it.

But the bottom line is due process. Mayor Wells acknowledged this should have gone through public consultation. Full public debate. And yet this is still missing: the bulldozers continue. What am I missing? What is the public missing?

We're missing the fact that the public should and needs to be consulted about development on lands that concern them. This concerns us all. Due Process. Accountability. Common courtesy. it's missing.