The 300-Acre Greenbelt
If the land is available and the conditions right, 60% of the 500 acre (200 h) VillageTown will be in what is called Greenbelt. The Greenbelt surrounds the urban core and industrial park, and it serves several purposes, e.g. a buffer to neighbors, the experience of nature, space for parks, sports activities, festivals, food and utility gardens and the supply of utilities, even a cemetery.
If there is additional land beyond the designated greenbelt, it may be used as productive farmland growing food for the VillageTown on a larger scale than the gardens.
The outer perimeter of the Greenbelt - all the neighbors see is Nature.
It is recommended that the perimeter serve as a shelter belt and a corridor for
native birds and animals.
Buffer: Cross boundary conflicts is a planner's term for what happens when two different zones are side-by-side. The VillageTown has an active urban core with people, noise and lights.This could bother the neighbors. The greenbelt provides a buffer zone so the neighbors see trees and the villagers are buffered from rural activity.
Nature: Nature grows by a different set of rules than a manicured garden. It is important to be able to walk in a forest or field, to see streams formed by gravity and earth, not concrete channels. If there is no land that is not the domain of Nature, it may be planted as a reserve.
Field of flowers, sheep-cut lawns: Sometimes green should have no practical use, just beauty and quiet. Plant a field of flowers, provide a hillside of sheep-cut grass.
Parks: Nature defines a garden as a collaboration between Nature and Human. Gardens can be rows of flowers, or a Japanese style work of art - a place of tranquility and mediation. They can be formal or casual. They can be native plants from the region, or a collection of exotic plants from around the world.
Sports: Sports requires open space - ball fields, equestrian grounds, exercise fitness trails, all of which are best placed in the Greenbelt. Sports that have spectators should be placed within a comfortable walk from the transport center where visitors' cars and buses are be parked.
Festivals: Like the sports fields, festivals require flat open ground where villagers and visitors can mix. These fields can serve for the visiting circus and farmer's market.
Food and Utility Gardens: Community allotments for gardening are often popular. Likewise, commercial land use may include raising trees for specialty furniture and plants used in waste water treatment.
Utilities: Water and perhaps a a reservoir, sewage treatment, recycling, energy systems are all potential activities appropriate for the greenbelt
Cemetery: The VillageTown will have a place to bury its dead. This should be in a quiet part of the greenbelt, perhaps approached through the field of flowers.
Less than an hour outside of St. Louis, you are in the country. Toward the north and west is farm country; toward the south are tree covered rolling hills as far as you can see. Either are a perfect setting for a Village Town. An hour or so and you are in a commercial center for connections to major transportation. Eastern Missouri is the perfect combination for building the Village Town. This is where your business should grow. This is where your children should be raised. Join me now and let's get started.
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