Photo credit: Aubrey Carr/The Beacon
Aubrey Carr/Staff Writer
FIU’s Nature Preserve is defined on its Go Green website as a “10-acre environmental education facility, representing the Florida Everglades…used to share ecological knowledge gained by university researchers with FIU students and the community.” According to the International Society of Arboriculture, the Preserve houses one federally endangered, 12 state endangered, three federally threatened, and 17 state threatened species. It’s a delicate part of MMC and to let sport facilities take precedence over it is absurd.
Although the plan is to expand the Nature Preserve from 10.8 to 10.93 acres, there is still the matter of whether or not the moved plants and animals will adapt to that change and how that will affect the overall acreage and biodiversity. As anyone who has ever relocated plants can attest, plants have an uncertain fate upon relocation, especially when they’re older.
A student held protest on Feb. 26 may have been the catalyst that prompted President Rosenberg to send a mass email a few days afterwards addressing the controversy surrounding the Preserve’s future. It shouldn’t have taken a student protest amidst angry, passionate gossip for FIU to formally address what has felt like the Nature Preserve’s impending doom.
FIU has attempted to try to put the new fields anywhere other than the Nature Preserve, but other options were too complex or expensive, like sharing Tamiami Park or too dangerous, like building near the traffic on Southwest 17th St.
If FIU had acquired the Fairgrounds, which currently belong to Miami-Dade County Fair & Exposition, the Nature Preserve wouldn’t need to be relocated. According to a 2014 FIU news article, “The Miami Herald’s opinion editors conducted an unscientific poll that resulted in 77 percent of participants supporting relocating the Fair so that FIU can expand into the 86 acres currently occupied by fairgrounds.” 86 acres would be more than enough to add the two new recreation and practice fields, and still allow for the business plans FIU had in 2014 for the rest of the land.
While a petition has been going around in efforts to “preserve the Preserve,” there is another petition that could potentially provide a more economical option for FIU.
Alexis Calatayud, the President of the Student Government Association, began this petition in February.
“[As of] November 2014 referendum, the Miami-Dade community demonstrated support for FIU’s expansion onto the land adjacent to the Modesto A. Maidique Campus by voting ‘Yes.’ It is imperative that we move forward with the plan to find the Fair a new home,” Calatayud said.
Calatayud asked that FIU students and faculty join her via petition “in asking Mayor Carlos A. Gimenez and members of the County Commission to please take action.” Out of 30 sites that have been studied, South Dade is the most feasible. “Relocating the Fair to South Dade is good for FIU and is good for the South Dade community, which has already expressed support and excitement about bringing the fair to their area,” she wrote.
Should the Fair be moved to South Dade, FIU could have another chance at acquiring the Fairgrounds and moving the two recreational and practice fields to those 86 acres instead of moving around parts of the Nature Preserve.
Now that President Rosenberg’s email has shed more light on the situation, students may be unsure whether to feel relieved that the Preserve is not going to be completely lost or hopeless that there seems to be nothing more we can do to leave the Preserve as it is.
Recreation and practice fields are not worth losing our little piece of the Everglades should anything go wrong when relocating the fauna. FIU has its football field, which underwent renovations in 2012, a gym which already has plans for renovations and the jogging track that surrounds the Nature Preserve. Although understandable that intramural and club teams wouldn’t want to play back to back well into the night, as is their only option right now, sports shouldn’t take priority over preserving a partially endangered environment.
There is a quiet, tranquil beauty about the Nature Preserve that would be disrupted if practise fields were to surround it as current plans suggest. FIU’s Go Green website said, “Great historic geologic formations still exist here today and are on display for all to see. Their fascinating designs bring visitors back to an ancient Miami that has long been lost due to development.” But it feels as though the construction is going to make that part of Miami feel a little less ancient, a little less important and a little less fascinating.
Perhaps the remodeled Preserve will be beautiful with the addition of ponds, but it will be different and students have shown that they aren’t ready for this change.
DISCLAIMER:
The opinions presented within this page do not represent the views of FIU Student Media Editorial Board. These views are separate from editorials and reflect individual perspectives of contributing writers and/or members of the University community.
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