It’s a wonderful coast

I wrote this as an Opinion piece for the Half Moon Bay Review. You can see the complete article on their site.

You’ve seen the movie a hundred times. In Frank Capra’s "It’s a Wonderful Life," George Bailey discovers what his community would have been like if he had never lived.

In this alternate universe, his wonderful town of Bedford Falls becomes the dreadful Pottersville, managed for the profit and glory of mean old Mr. Potter. When the movie was made in 1946, Bedford Falls represented a way of life that was about to disappear from communities across America in the postwar sprawl of malls, freeways, strip centers and vast housing developments.

More than a half-century later, the Coastside can go either way. We can build a Bedford Falls. Or we can build a Pottersville.

In Bedford Falls, there is a real downtown with thriving businesses that serve the community. In Pottersville, the residents have abandoned downtown to the riff-raff and out-of-towners. Locals do all their shopping at malls over the hill, or at the strip malls that are popping up on the edge of town.

In Bedford Falls, there are community parks in the center of town that everyone can enjoy. In Pottersville, there are few real public parks because no politician wants his opponents to get credit for building them. Whether you get to enjoy a park there depends on where you live. There are some nice parks attached to the better developments.

In Bedford Falls, kids can wander in the woods and fields and streams. They can hike, bike and ride horses in the hills.

In Pottersville, all the open space is private property, protected by fences with "No Trespassing" signs nailed to them. In some places, there are even guards to keep track of who’s trying to walk across the land.

In Bedford Falls, people can still see hawks and frogs and snakes in the fields. In Pottersville, there are no fields left, but people can see statues of these animals in front of the local strip mall and faded pictures of them in a display case at the library.

In Bedford Falls, kids go surfing. In Pottersville, they hang out at the Surf Village Shopping Center.

In Bedford Falls, kids attend school in the same building as their parents did, but it has been lovingly restored. Pottersville is on its fourth school. Each new school board starts construction on a new one a little further out of town, because the old schools are dilapidated and weren’t as great as had been promised, even on the day they opened.

In Bedford Falls, people meet each other at restaurants downtown. In Pottersville, they get they lunch at the drive-through. And the person who takes their order is talking into a headset in India.

In Bedford Falls, the newspaper stands up for the little guy and it covers the issues fairly. In Pottersville, the newspaper rewards Mr. Potter’s cronies and embarrasses his enemies.

In Bedford Falls, political campaigns are about the issues and the debate is lively and open. In Pottersville, campaign signs disappear from lawns in the middle of the night - or the middle of the day - and the campaigns are mean and nasty.

In Bedford Falls, you can get where you need to go by walking. In Pottersville, you need a car to get around. The only people who walk are those who can’t afford a car and they’re constantly threatened by traffic.

In Bedford Falls, the community makes its own entertainment, with parades, cook-offs, fireworks and festivals that are well-run and raise money for good causes. In Pottersville, everyone goes out of town to the megaplex for entertainment. Or they sit at home and watch TV. Or they just work late.

Take another look at your community. Bedford Falls is all around you.

The Coastside is an old-fashioned Frank Capra town where the way of life is threatened by the sprawl that’s just over the hill. One reason sprawl is so awful is that it happens incrementally, one stupid project at a time, with no thought to how it all fits together.

In "It’s a Wonderful Life," one man made a difference between Bedford Falls and Pottersville. That’s a little unrealistic. Here on the Coastside, we’re all going to have to work together to make the difference.