Shaping the Sierra: Nature, Culture, and Conflict in the Changing West

The rural west is at a crossroads, and the Sierra Nevada is at the center of this social and economic change. The Sierra Nevada landscape has always been valued for its bounty of natural resource commodities, but new residents and an ever-growing flood of tourists to the area have transformed the relationship between the region's nature and its culture. In an engaging narrative that melds the personal with the professional, Timothy P. Duaneand#151;who grew up in the areaand#151;documents the impact of rapid population growth on the culture, economy, and ecology of the Sierra Nevada since the late 1960s. He also recommends innovative policies for mitigating the negative effects of future population growth in this spectacular but threatened region, as well as throughout the rural west.

Today, the primary social and economic values of the Sierra Nevada landscape are in the amenities and ecological services provided by its wildlands and functioning ecosystems. Duane shows how further unfettered population growth threatens the very values which have made the Sierra Nevada a desirable place to live and work. A new approach to land use planning, resource management, and local economic developmentand#151;one that recognizes the emerging values of the landscapeand#151;is necessary in order to achieve sustainable development, Duane claims. Weaving personal experience with outstanding scholarship, he shows how such an approach must explicitly recognize the importance of values and the application of an environmental land ethic to future development in the area.

"Tim Duane has written an inspiring and instructive text. It's a massive accomplishment. . . Rich in personal anecdote and hands-on experience--heading straight into thorny and contentious issues--angry polarizations--and finally suggesting some emerging models of a responsible life-in-place that go beyond the current debates. The reach of Duane's study corrals far more than the Sierra Nevada. It will be of use to those who wrstle with the dilemmas of eonomy and ecology overywhere. This clear book dispels a lot of (rhetorical) smoke from around the Range of Light."and#151;Gary Snyder, author of Mountains and Rivers Without End

"Shaping the Sierra is beautifully produced, with attractive maps and a layout that match the polished scholarship. Still, what impresses about the book is the example of Duane himself: a concerned inhabitant who has put his passion to work protecting a landscape he loves."and#151;Christine Colasurdo, San Francisco Chronicle

Timothy P. Duane is Associate Professor of City and Regional Planning, Landscape Architecture, and Environmental Planning at the University of California, Berkeley.