Anyone from New Jersey that has ventured out of our great state has heard this "joke" more times than they'd like. And really, I find no merit in it. True, I have to get off at exit 29 off 78W to 287, then exit 19 to 206, but I then drive quite a bit to get to my hometown. My hometown is awesome; we have open land preserved all over the place, and we have mandates requiring a certain amount of space between each house (which Roanoke definitely doesn't have considering I've seen some houses in the county that are LITERALLY a stone's throw away).
But let's be honest, Jersey is heavily populated, and has tons of people. I'll spare everyone the numbers, because they don't matter. The "Dirty Jersey" has some of it's roots in the facts that North Jersey stinks (literally), and we like to dump into the ocean relatively close to shore (is that still true?).
But don't knock it. At least they recycle. Occasionally, you run into a city or county that has recycling pick up in the Roanoke area, but it's not widespread. In my area, the Cave Spring area of Roanoke County, you have to drive to recycle.
What's up?
I once heard that city areas (like Jersey, New York City, LA, etc) emit less pollution (relatively) compared to rural areas - and I believe it.
In addition to no recycling pick up, farmers allow their cattle to graze through creeks (BAD for the watershed, REALLY BAD), big trucks are the norm (and many are diesel), and people in general have to drive a longer distance to get to even the essential location, like the grocery store or the pharmacy.
One family in my parents' neighborhood has covered their entire roof in solar panels, and I personally saw two more just driving to the store to get my Dad a Fathers' Day present. I don't see any solar panels around Roanoke - and I feel like I've been around the area quite a bit.
How does that work? Why does it take urbanization for us to realize the importance of being Green? Why are we a society that has to see, push, and exceed the brink in order to backtrack and start doing things "right"???
Why can't we preserve before we sabotage?
Why did we have to watch the polar bears swim for food (which is not something they did before the polar ice cap started to melt) before we started recognizing the damage being done to our precarious green house?
We are a society of many things - good and bad. But, in my opinion, our biggest plague is our inability to see into the future. We live by the motto, "Live like there's no tomorrow." Guess what? We got our wish.
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