RENFREW HISTORY WALK

At our In nature, With Nature retreat yesterday, I lead a walk through some little know parts of Renfrew, relating the impact of industrialization on the natural environment. As we walked I added comments about the ways that our growth as an industrial and railway town had changed the landscape. I also noted how, with the economic shift of the past 30 years, the character and landscape has changed again, leaving scars of a huge scale. We paused at the old industrial zone with empty and collapsing foundries and grain mills.  We passed through a factory site, unnamed by any of our group, which showed rusting machine mounts and concrete slabs. The whole site was nearly entirely overgrown with trees and shrubs and now anonymous.

 
We walked past the main town recycling site and noted how much land in our town needs to be reserved for waste management. Later we strolled through Mateway Park. I explained the emergence of the modern “park” as a civilizing space in modern urban landscapes. It was interesting to appreciate how much we value these as “natural” spaces and forget how much of the space of an urban park is carefully premeditated and preserved to appear in a form that planners consider to be nature-like. We observed the scattering of sports facilities and zones around the park and how these structured recreation spaces belong to the same concept of the modern park. Organized sports arose at the same historical period as the modern park and provide the place for those who use structured space for structured activities. The ideas of solitary strolling, interaction with the environment and of a wild space are all absent.

Yours , on the journey,                           
Ray
Walk as if you are kissing the Earth with your feet
Thich Nhat Hahn