The wrong view on the Oregon Trail

By Stafford Hazelett

, Jan 20, 2009, Updated Oct 30, 2009

L.E. Baskow / pamplin media group

Wind turbines, like these along the Columbia River Gorge, could dot the landscpae along the Oregon Trail if developers are left to their own devices.

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Oregon became an American state in 1859 because so many American settlers came here over the Oregon Trail. In 1993, we celebrated the Oregon Trail and the 150-year anniversary of the Great Migration of 1,000 settlers. The Oregon Trail Interpretive Center at Baker City and the End of the Trail Interpretive Center at Oregon City welcomed hundreds of thousands of visitors. The State of Oregon installed interpretive signs at rest areas along the historic corridor of the original trail, Interstate 84, as the Forest Service and the Bureau of Land Management erected new interpretive markers at historic sites. Guide books to the Oregon Trail sold by the thousands. Families took Oregon Trail vacation tours.

But the Oregon Trail is in the way of a gold rush that promises to demolish part of our history and leave us poorer.

The Oregon Economic and Community Development Department is commanded by statute to promote the Oregon Trail as a major tourist attraction consistent with maintaining the historical integrity of the Oregon Trail; I wish that were the gold rush I write about.

The gold rush that threatens the Oregon Trail is “free” and “green” energy from wind power. Some of the most attractive areas for developing wind energy are on and along the Oregon Trail. It is not difficult for wind energy developers to plan to avoid the Oregon Trail and protect the viewshed in a few especially historic locations - the location of the Oregon Trail is well known. It was surveyed by Oregon State Highway Department engineers in the 1950s for the Oregon Centennial and surveyed again in the 1970s — the route was designated by Congress. The developers have easy access to that free information.

Protecting the Oregon Trail requires little effort if the location of the Oregon Trail were considered at the beginning of the project. A few developers, including Portland General Electric, have planned to protect the known historic sites to reduce the impact on the Oregon Trail, but most have chosen to ignore the presence of the Oregon Trail and plan to build where it suits them.

Building a wind energy project puts permanent concrete pads, weighing around 750 tons, and permanent towers, weighing around 300 tons, on a space equal to half of a city lot. The towers are 40 stories high, which is higher than the tallest skyscraper in downtown Portland. The generators go on top of the towers. The useful life of the generators is about 20 years if the tower stands that long. After that, they are just scrap.

The towers already built have cost Oregon taxpayers over $300,000,000. More hundreds of millions of dollars are already committed to ongoing projects. The governor wants to extend and increase the amount of money for wind energy projects on the Oregon Trail without requiring developers to avoid and protect the trail.

Some sacrifices are always made in the name of progress - we cannot roll back time or live in a museum. On the other hand, when public funds are used to destroy irreplaceable historic public treasures, perhaps we should be a little more careful and consider whether we should proceed.

We can protect the Oregon Trail and have wind energy at the same time, but only Governor Kulongoski and the Legislative Assembly can make that happen. Tell the governor you think they should at governor.oregon.gov.

Stafford Hazelett lives in Aloha.