STUDENTS WANT TO PRESERVE GORMAN 2,800 ACRES WOULD BE SET ASIDE AS WILDFLOWER AREA.Byline: Eugene Tong Staff Writer GORMAN - This gray pit-stop along Interstate 5 on the Grapevine Grapevine - A distributed system project. blossoms into a bright, vibrant tapestry once a year in the spring when wildflowers cover its hillsides - a scene that a group of UCLA UCLA University of California at Los Angeles UCLA University Center for Learning Assistance (Illinois State University) UCLA University of Carrollton, TX and Lower Addison, TX Extension landscape-architecture students hopes could be protected from future development. These 25 students in the course Advanced Environmental Analysis and Planning compiled a 92-page report aimed at dedicating 2,800 acres along a 5-mile stretch of Gorman Post Road as a wildflower wildflower Any flowering plant that grows without intentional human aid. Wildflowers are the source of all cultivated garden varieties of flowers. A wildflower growing where it is unwanted is considered a weed. preserve. The proposal, which they plan to present to local property owners, was unveiled Saturday. ``You sort of think about Gorman as the place where you have to stop and put (snow) chains on your car,'' said Greg Maher, a third-year landscape architecture student and co-manager of the class project. ``But it's more than that. There is just a lot that's going on around here. ``It's definitely about the wildflowers. But it's also about what's happening to the last vestiges of open space in Southern California Southern California, also colloquially known as SoCal, is the southern portion of the U.S. state of California. Centered on the cities of Los Angeles and San Diego, Southern California is home to nearly 24 million people and is the nation's second most populated region, .'' A sleepy town dotted with a few motels and gas stations, Gorman is the last outpost before the Los Angeles-Kern county line. It was a key stop on the old Ridge Route The Ridge Route, officially the Castaic-Tejon Route,[2] is a narrow two-lane highway in the northern Greater Los Angeles Area of the U.S. state of California. through the Tehachapi Mountains Te·hach·a·pi Mountains A range of southern California extending from east to west between the Sierra Nevada and the Coast Ranges north of Los Angeles. , though its importance waned with the construction of Interstate 5. Still, the area remains renowned for its natural scenery - local poppies inspired artist Christo to set 1,760 giant umbrellas in 1991 along the Grapevine as part of his ``Umbrellas'' project. But development is creeping in. A spring-water farm and a small subdivision have been proposed, while The Tejon Ranch Tejon Ranch Company is the largest private landowner in California. It was incorporated in 1936 to organise the ownership of a large tract of land originally comprised of four Mexican land grants, and began ranching in the 1840's. Co. is planning the 23,000-home Centennial development to the north. It adds up to a fertile classroom for University of California, Los Angeles UCLA comprises the College of Letters and Science (the primary undergraduate college), seven professional schools, and five professional Health Science schools. Since 2001, UCLA has enrolled over 33,000 total students, and that number is steadily rising. , Extension planning instructor Michael O'Brien Michael or Mike O'Brien may refer to:
``It's a different kind of planning exercise,'' said O'Brien, a city of Los Angeles
``That particular area is ecologically valuable. It's a conjunction of three major ecological areas. The desert, the mountains and the coast all come together right there - it's unique. We want people to know how great this site is, and how precarious this site is right now.'' The students spent eight weeks compiling land use, ecology, geology and environmental data to design a 2,800-acre preserve stretching from the intersection of Interstate 5 and state Route 138 to Gorman's northeast town limits. They also propose a visitors center and granting Gorman Post Road state scenic highway status. ``This is a big-picture sort of thing,'' Maher said. ``We're looking at how something can be used 10 to 20 years down the road. We've never really dealt with anything like that before.'' Whether the proposal takes root depends on the 22 private-property owners who own the 48 parcels covering the preserve site. ``We're not proposing to take away anybody's land,'' Maher said. ``It's at what point do you say, 'Enough, leave this place alone?''' For student planner Meg Sullivan, the project took her studies out of the classroom and into the center of community planning policy. ``When we have assignments up to this point, even if it's designing a park or public place, nobody would've heard about it,'' she said. ``We had a sense that what we're doing can really matter. ``We hope that we could have an impact on this site. We all fell in love with it.'' Eugene Tong, (661) 257-5253 eugene.tong(at)dailynews.com |
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