It addressed suburban sprawl and inner-city decay by advocating mixed zoning for attractive urban villages. Anklam Wash. This is what has happened to the fragile green belt on either side of the wash in the last two years. Twenty-four mature ocotillos and a dozen saguaros were removed and died before being replanted. The homes' landscaping consists of a tree or bush on handkerchief-sized gravel yards.
Every building is one of three shades of sand.
What used to be a small vista of desert vegetation is now a sea of identical roofs. Five homes are already for sale again. K.E.G. Construction has just bladed 5 acres of virgin cholla behind Brichta School and bulldozed soil into Anklam Wash, stabilizing it with cemented rock, to put up 35 homes with virtually no yards. The morning after the little square of teddybear cholla was razed, a family of coyotes dug frantically in the bare ground to find rabbits and ground squirrels buried alive. Codes required all three developments to dig retention basins, even though the natural drainage would be into the wash.