LOVED IT & LOST IT — Tell us about some special place in your life that has been ruined by population growth

Some accuse us of opposition to “progress.”  Or of impractical nostalgia, if we long for a less-congested America.  But is the quality of life made better by the addition of 100 million people to the U.S. since 1970?

Let’s give each other glimpses of places we have loved in our lives that really don’t exist any more because of massive population growth (most of it driven by national immigration policies).

A fishing hole? A secluded path through the woods? A marsh where we observed the birds and much more? A special hunting spot? Any kind of open space at the edge of town?

In fact, the edge of town is where destruction is usually the greatest.  Were you once able to get to nature and open spaces in far less time than you can today?  How about a treasured place of quaintness and a strong sense of community that has been dramatically changed by additional lanes of traffic or the swallowing of small towns and rural crossroads by ever-spreading metropolitan masses? 

Please write a short description in the Comments section below of a place like that in your life.  A place that you can say you have LOVED IT & LOST IT because of the pressures of population growth. 

What’s the point?

Well, if we can be reminded of what has been lost while adding the THIRD 100 million to our population, then maybe we can be a little more clear of what we will lose if we allow Congress to use immigration to add the FOURTH 100 million over the next 30 years — or the FIFTH and SIXTH 100 million that the Census Bureau says immigration will add by the end of this century.

Right now, we’re just gathering little comments.  We expect to come back to you later to ask you if you would like to provide more details and flesh out the story.  Why was this lost place important in your development?  How did it play a role in your relationships with other people?  What has been destroyed, and how?  Give us a glimpse.

The population growth that destroyed your beloved place may not have been directly driven by immigration.  But immigration — and the descendants of immigration — since 1970 have accounted for most U.S. population growth. And the settlement in one place by large numbers of immigrants often is a factor in Americans moving and causing large-scale population growth in another place.

Keep in mind, though, that the problems we are looking at are not caused by immigrants but by the population growth that immigration policies have forced. In this exercise, we are not focusing on what we don’t like but on the things we have loved that have been taken away from us.

I recall talking to a 90-year-old man who had lived in Los Angeles all his life who nearly wept in explaining how much he still missed the fragrance of the orange groves that once had been a constant companion.

Heck, I miss the fact that when I moved to the Washington D.C. area in 1987 I could drive about 10 minutes and begin to wind through bucolic farmland.  Now, I can drive for a half-hour (non-rush hour) and see little other than cookie-cutter condo developments, strip malls and treeless tract houses.

And while you are at it, enter a separate entry on places you dearly love to day that you believe are in dire threat of being overcome by population-driven development over the next decade or two.

While Members of Congress fall all over themselves not only to continue to force 300 million more people into this country this century but actually increase the rate of growth, we really need to remind ourselves, our fellow citizens and our elected officials what can be lost in the process.

Let’s get personal.  Thanks.

ROY BECK is Founder & CEO of NumbersUSA