Scott Smith is an alert “06880” reader, a longtime Westporter and an ardent environmentalist. He writes:
As the owner of a modest Westport home that will surely be torn down once I’m gone, I’ve long read with interest stories about the fate of similar properties around town.
It’s sad to see photos showing strips of yellow police tape and a demolition notice in front of the excavator doing its business – erasing a house that surely held generations of good memories.
Sadder still is to read of all the mature trees cut down and old growth obliterated, often with clear-cut efficiency, to make way for the new McMansion to come.
New construction, on Ferry Lane East.
That’s progress, I guess. Trees are a renewable resource, and I’m sure a new family will be making happy memories in their shiny new home, with its upsized square footage and tax roll valuation. Good for them – and for helping keep our Grand List mill rate enviably low.
But here’s what strikes me about these spanking new trophy homes: After spending 2 or 3 million dollars on the house itself, why are these new homeowners content with a cheapo landscape design that typically consists of a puny row of boxwood shrubs along a Belgian-brick pathway to the door, and a yard of wall-to-wall sod?
These cookie-cutter plots are not just aesthetic wastelands. They are also effectively sterile environments that do nothing to help preserve and perpetuate native plants and wildlife.
So, while I don’t wish to add to the town-wide rules about how to renovate a private property for future use, I suggest the town be more proactive in encouraging developers and new homeowners to have a landscaping plan that emphasizes planting more native shrubs, trees and perennial flowers, rather than a lawn of monoculture grass and a few foreign ornamentals.
A more thoughtful, sustainable approach to landscaping would protect threatened populations of local birds and pollinators, and more of the native plants and animals we like to see. It could also reduce the ruinous amount of toxic pesticides and synthetic fertilizers needed to keep these mow-and-blow yards manicured, but which poison the ground and pollute our waterways.
Fortunately, there are many resources to help enhance both property values and our shared natural habitat.
Westport’s Pollinator Pathways, a collaborative effort by Wakeman Town Farm, Earthplace, the Westport Garden Club and others, encourages public and private properties to restore or create pesticide-free plant habitats for pollinating insects and wildlife to rest, eat and breed.
Grown close enough together (native bees have a range of about 800 yards) and near larger parks and preserves, pollinator pathways aim to “defragment” the urban/suburban environment so it can support sustainable populations of wildlife.
Aspetuck Land Trust has its own Green Corridor initiative, which invites area gardeners to plant native, switch to organic or zero-emissions lawn care services, and stop using pesticides.
That seems to me a worthwhile goal that all homeowners, new and old, should rally behind.
The passions generated by the besieged community gardeners at Long Lots testify to a strong desire to preserve and protect our existing greenscape.
So too do the efforts of those who spread daffodils throughout the town. Those fetching blossoms each spring — even if native pollinators or even deer want nothing to do with them — are a further sign that Westporters value a collective effort to both beautify and enhance our natural landscape.
Let’s urge the area’s developers and landscapers to join in creating a more sustainable, biodiverse community, starting with the clean slate that comes with each new Westport home.
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capitalism
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Thanks, Dan! And, yes, Richard, attractive landscaping can add as much as 10% to the (resale) value of a home. Great ROI!
many nee homes have incredibly immature landscape design. If they include trees tue trees often look like tooth picks
Dan, I wish this piece was entitled: Pollinator Pathways, Please…
I almost didn’t read it!! But yes- that is a super idea for new builds!,
And, Hey, New Folks!! get involved in
Wakeman TOWN FARM- see the pollinator pathways in action next summer and maybe save a swath of that new, long driveway or side yard for a small “meadow or pollinator filled garden”
I planted a beautiful front lawn/yard w CLOVER- last year and I was rewarded and frankly, blown away in late summer by the bees and butterflies traveling south✨✨🍀✨✨✨
It is possible to have a nice manicured landscape that includes natives in a diverse planting scheme. You can mixed your desired ornamentals with well behaved natives for beautiful curb appeal. There are many U-Conn Master Gardeners in our town who are happy to help homeowners navigate toward this goal, including those who volunteer at Wakeman. I for one give workshops at the Bartlett Arboretum on this as well as many other topics. For a deep dive into the importance of have a diverse landscape, read Doug Tallamy.
on new construction it seems to me that almost all the thought and money goes into the house. the landscape is a minor consideration. There are multimillion dollar homes all over town with front views to large power cables and transformers. Beauty is in the eye of the beholder.
Right on Scott
Well written
The answer is that Westport is plagued by spec builders. I don’t know whether it’s because our land prices have historically been lower than those in Greenwich, Darien, or New Canaan, or just some historical quirk, but I’d bet at least 75% of new construction in town is on speculation, much more than you see in neighboring communities. Spec building = cutting corners wherever possible. Landscaping is an easy corner to cut. The worst offender is SIR, but they’re one of many. (The house posted here is ironically nicer looking than 90% of what’s built in Westport these days.)
With home prices where they are, I suspect most buyers of these houses can’t afford to spend tens of thousands of dollars or more to do proper landscaping for their $3-5 million house. I’ve been inside many of them and judging by the furniture, there’s not much money left after the mortgage and car loan are paid.
The lack of landscaping is actually a pretty minor issue from an ecological perspective when it comes to spec building practices in Westport. Building cheap houses with trendy finishes (e.g., black windows) that will look dated or require replacement in a few years results in extreme waste. (Manufacturing all those “energy efficient” plastic windows and doors and luxury vinyl planks consumes a lot of resources, and then they’ll end up in a landfill for eons!) Spec builders max out the square footage to make more money on the sale, which results in massive energy overuse. (When end users build a house, they have less incentive to do this.) Flooding and water contamination are worsened when lot coverage balloons and natural absorption systems (trees) are removed.
So the real issue is supersized spec building, not landscaping. That’s something we can easily regulate.
capitalism.
For the life of me, I don’t understand when people want their yards to look like golf courses. While it’s bad for the pollinators it’s also just so… generic and bland.
We’re on a little-less than half-acre lot, but two oaks and two maples provide shade in the summer and suck up a lot of water when it rains. And while the heirloom apple trees we planted are in a never-ending battle against the deer, it’s always fun to get a crop. Most of the smaller plantings around the house are for the bees, butterflies, and (with any luck) hummingbirds. d
My niece, Sarah Bergmann, pretty much began the Pollinator Pathway movement in Seattle WA., many, many years ago. Efforts to maintain or create beauty must always be supported. We all can do that with our words, writings and support of those who do the right thing. Far too often, it is the short term interest in money, profit, that does so much damage. Try to think long term.
Great piece, Scott. Thanks. Hoping more and more residents and developers will ‘take a more thoughtful, sustainable approach to landscaping’, as you suggest.
Maybe they are among those who think the Community Gardens can just be “relocated”? PLEASE Westport, don’t destroy an existing treasure.
In a recent 06880 post about this very subject, Tree Board member Dick Stein listed the major reasons for home builders removal of existing mature trees on site.
His comments bear repeating.
Hi Scott, I really appreciated this. I’ve long noticed this exact problem in a lot of new builds. My problem with a lot of new builds are numerous (not least of which is this exact reason), but I feel as though some proper landscaping and a mitigation to this endless field of grass that is so common would help greatly! Lots of streets I’ve noticed as the years have passed that used to be more heavily wooded are now practically barren, leaving nothing but stumps and monocultures behind.
I agree with the comments but as someone who built a home recently, there is also a very steep cost with landscaping. Many of us need a little time (few years) to recoup some the expenses of building a new home. It’s on our list to do but in the meantime with put grass and shrubs in just to make the house presentable.