Every year I pass through New Jersey’s infamous Pine Barrens on my way to and from Long Beach Island. From the Four Mile Circle near Pemberton until it approaches Manahawkin, Route 72 is about 20-25 miles of unbroken forest. Much of what I drive through has been preserved as state forest land, but there once was a time when the future of the Pine Barrens was in question. In 1968, when Princeton Professor John McPhee published The Pine Barrens, all indicators were leading him to believe that the future of the region would be quite different than the present that exists today. Had the predictions made in the book came to pass, the ride to the shore would look entirely different, as I would be driving through a huge city. Apparently, it was published at just the right time, when something could still be done to change the outcome.
McPhee covered several aspects of the Pine Barrens and its people in his book, but what stood out most to me was the outlook for the future, made from a 1967 standpoint. It had somewhat amazed him that, in the wake of the post-World War II suburban sprawl, the Pine Barrens had so far remained undeveloped. But he didn’t see it lasting long, as the Pine Barrens stood in the bustling Northeast Corridor. Sprawl was threatening from both Philadelphia and the New York/New Jersey metro area. And there was also the matter of the proposed jetport to be built near Toms River, with a new city of a quarter million people built around it, the details of which sound futuristic to me even as I read the book now, over 40 years after its first publication.
The Pine Barrens apparently came out at the right time, looking forward and backward. McPhee researched the book at a time when he had links to both a past that was long gone, and a future that never quite materialized. There were still some people old enough to remember the old way of life in the Pine Barrens, and even some of the long vanished towns, recollections which McPhee saved forever in print. One of his links to the future was a private planner named Herbert Smith, whose firm was eager to take on the task of designing the proposed jetport and new city. He was excited to give McPhee a tour of this metropolis which had yet to be built.
I haven’t been able to find out exactly what happened, but the ground for this jetport and new city was never broken. The jetport was projected to open around 1973, five years after The Pine Barrens was published. I don’t know if lobbying for this project was stopped by political action, or if it was dropped for other reasons. One thing that is certain, at least according to the Pinelands Commission website, is that McPhee’s book had a huge influence on conservation efforts. During the 1970’s those efforts worked to establish state forests that saved thousands of acres of land. Through it all, including the retooling of Atlantic City into a gambling mecca, the Pinelands have stood intact, although I don’t know how much land was actually developed since 1968. But that development has at least been controlled.
Some aspects of the development may have been advantageous, particularly the jetport. Having a mega-airport and transportation center in Ocean County would have been more convenient than going to Philadelphia International or Newark, at least for some people. And since construction of a railroad was part of the plan, it would have made the northern Jersey Shore more easily accessible by rail. However, I personally would not see these things as worth sacrificing the Pine Barrens for, even though the city plan did call for some preservation. And today it seems that some details of this plan, such as passenger planes that could connect the jetport with Europe in 90 minutes, never really became widespread. I’m glad that McPhee’s book came out when it did, which at least in part helped to preserve the rare ecosystem and keep development in check.
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