Letter to the editor

Another Small Ecosystem Gone

Few will notice that the half-mile stretch of waterway running east-west from Lamb Boulevard to Boulder Highway, part of the ambitious system of interconnected washes and trails leading to the Las Vegas Wash area, is gone.

Like other areas, the Regional Flood Control District has determined that this small ecosystem -- alive with small fish, frogs, crawdads, visiting egrets, ducks and more for decades -- must be cement-encased. A straight corridor -- unlike the corner coming off of the "Miracle Mile," which definitively required a vigorous structure -- this straight, flat, broad wash area was not prone to washouts or abnormal wear. However, it was filled with small animal life and was in the middle of the city.

Now it will be a cement corridor devoid of life other than green algae, and it will have a corresponding cement walking path bordered by cement walls.

Aside from the fundamental miscue of not soliciting input from those of us who are physically adjacent to the wash, the trail system has lacked several things from the beginning. A comprehensive plan, as opposed to the single-segment, multi-city/county approach, has led to cost overruns using private consultants still consulting on how to build a path yet reinvented at every distinct segment and municipality. And since the funding mechanism has no previous constituency, and based on the earlier sale of public lands, there are no outcries for cost overruns and delays of expenditures and completion dates.

Reiterating some ideas I already have shared with project engineers: Allow for safety exits from long, high-walled, enclosed paths; use the adopt-a-quarter-mile concept to help with cleanup efforts; utilize solar-powered CCTV to better surveil the paths; discard any expensive future bridges in favor of dual street and below-street passages; contact those adjacent to the wash tributaries to help foster bird and tree growth conducive to the wash areas; and from this point forward, stop encasing small ecosystems where it is not necessary.

-- Martin Dean Dupalo

Las Vegas