Information superhighway: an environmental menace

USA Today (Society for the Advancement of Education), Sept, 1995

The information superhighway poses a dangerous threat to the environment, according to James H. Snyder, a Northwestern University professor specializing in the impacts of new technology. "Unbeknownst to the advocates of telecommuting, the coming information superhighway portends an environmental disaster of the first magnitude," he told the World Future Society.

Increased telecommuting, he indicated, may allow a massive movement of people to what currently are rural areas. The existing infrastructure there may not be able to handle such a sudden and large influx of new residents, and the over-all ecological impacts that such a migration would bring have not even begun to be examined.

"If all Americans succeed in getting their dream house with several acres of land, the forests and open lands across the entire continental United States will be destroyed," he warned. Rather than building up with high-rises, people would start to build outward. A one-acre apartment building housing 200 families would become 200 five-acre homesteads spread out over 1,000 acres. "Even if the average home lot only increases from a quarter of an acre to an acre, the environmental destruction would be huge."

To stave this off, Snider proposes strengthening land-conservation incentives and laws, but acknowledged that such efforts will face may obstacles. "The tendency to want a homestead with at least an acre is deeply rooted, and efforts to preserve open spaces will come into conflict with this powerful drive and the economic forces that cater to it."