Human habitat destruction. Fire can eliminate and type-convert human communities as well as natural communities.
The Impact of Wildfires on Human Communities
Or how middle class neighborhoods with connections to the natural environment can be type-converted to upper income enclaves of concrete and homogenized landscapes by wildfire
Human habitats, as well as natural communities, can be seriously compromised by wildfire events. One of the reasons so many fire fighting resources were deployed around the rural town of Julian during the 2003 Cedar fire was the recognition of how a destructive fire would threaten the community's continued existence and seriously compromise its intimate connection with the surrounding natural environment.
During the 1993 Old Topanga fire in Los Angeles County, the community was not as fortunate a Julian. 323 homes were destroyed. The impacted area was rebuilt, but the important question is how and in what manner did the rebuild change the community?
Many of the homes prior to the 1993 fire were relatively affordable (by California standards) and housed primarily middle class families. Today, all that has changed. According to a recently retired Los Angeles City firefighter, many of the new homes are multi-million dollar estates. "Used to be all you saw up there were old Volkswagon vans. Now you have to dodge BMWs and Porsches when trying to negotiate the streets," he said.
Changes of a similar type are occurring in the Scripps Ranch Community in San Diego. Modest homes burned down by the 2003 Cedar fire have been replaced by enlarged, lot covering replacements with goats being used to eliminate the surrounding, native shrublands (see photos below). Are the social and natural resource costs of eliminating surrounding habitat exceeding the assumed benefits of wildfire risk reduction? Is 200 feet+ of bare dirt really necessary for a community of new homes that has been built under strict fire safety codes? Will the community be able to keep up the yearly maintenance required to control the annual crop of highly flammable, alien weeds that will now take over the site?
Beyond the now enlarged, dirt strip there still exists a remarkable, natural habitat than can improve the quality of life of the families who live in the new homes. Unfortunately, it seems fear of nature has replaced enjoyment and the children there will not have the opportunity to experience the natural world in a way that was once a crucial part of growing up. Without such intimate contact with roadrunners, ceanothus blooms, and kangaroo rats, how will these children view nature when they are adults?
For more information on the importance of wild nature in the human habitat, see Richard Louv's book highlighted on our Education Page. You might also want to check out the . They are dedicated to the conservation of species, habitats, and ecological processes in urban and urbanizing areas.
The herd munching through three-year-old post-fire chaparral. Photo: Scripps Ranch Fire Safe Council (SRFSC).
