If we protect them, I believe, we will automatically protect ourselves as well. Everyone is aware of the environmental costs of oil drilling, rainforest burning, and the automobile, but few people, even among environmentalists, have given much thought to the destructive power of road, highway, and freeway construction. Roads are taken for granted. Most people have allowed themselves to become so dependent on the automobile that the destruction caused by cars and roads has become invisible to them. It is impossible to drill for oil, log, or even deluge the wilderness with tourists without roads.
Roads are key.
Roadbuilding is usually rationalized by saying that pollution is caused by traffic congestion, and that therefore what we need to do is widen roads so that traffic can flow smoothly. Since the road lobby likes to use the medical model, let's continue the analogy. You go to your doctor complaining of nasal congestion. I would like to close with one new argument for bicycling instead of driving. Psychological research has shown that rats raised in a stimulating environment actually increase in intelligence over their cousins raised in a stimulus-barren environment.