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2010. 10.23-24 (토-일) 자 오피니언 Thoughts of The Times
Exploring Mojave Desert
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By Lee Sun-ho
In early October, I took a bus trip to the Mojave Desert (pronounced mo-hah-vee) as one of a 68-member tour group to the western U.S. guided by Samhotour on the occasion of the 55th anniversary of entering my coed high school in 1955.
It allowed me to do a lot of fact finding on natural surroundings and artificial touches through human endeavors on the arid desert of 64,759 square kilometers, nicknamed the High Desert. Until I saw the many different spots and heard of their history and current developments, I had no opportunity to pay attention to deserts in the global village.
I was virtually unaware of the fact that the whole desert area spans four different states: most of San Bernardino County, California, southern Nevada, the southwestern corner of Utah, and the Mojave County of Arizona across the Colorado River. Named after the Mojave (meaning People by the River) tribe of American Indians, the desert has a typical mountain-and-basin topography with sparse vegetation, receiving 254 millimeters of rain a year.
I confirmed that the Mojave Desert’s boundaries are generally defined by the presence of Joshua trees, considered an indicator species for the desert. The Joshua tree is native to southwestern North America. The name was given by a group of Mormon settlers who crossed the desert in the mid-19th century.
Turning to the primary water resources, I could easily find groundwater and the Mojave and Colorado Rivers for the desert’s plants and animals, and the booming populations of many desert cities and towns.
The Mojave Desert is crossed by major highways: Interstates 15 and 40, Highways 58, 95, and 515, and State Routes 14, 127 and 190. One regrettable change informed to me on the spot was the fortune of the previous Interstate 66 opened in 1926, a historic connection across the U.S. from the heartland (Chicago) to the coast (Los Angeles) which was eventually bypassed by Interstate 40 in 1973. Some portion of Highway 58 near the town of Mojave in Kern County, Calif., was named as the Korean War Veterans Memorial Highway, as I read a big highway signboard.
Las Vegas, meaning meadows in Spanish, Nev., was once watered by underground springs, creating a natural oasis. Today much of its water is pumped from Lake Mead at the nearby Colorado River. It is the largest city in the Mojave Desert and the nation’s fastest growing entertainment city of over two million citizens in which around 20,000 ethnic Koreans dwell.
There were smaller cities and towns in the Mojave Desert I dropped by. Barstow, Calif., is a convenient transportation hub, best known as being the midway between Los Angeles and Las Vegas. A Korea-born businessman was running a big healthcare drugstore called the Dream Health Food Center on its Main Street. Laughlin in Clark County, Nev., facing Bullhead City, Ariz. across the Colorado River is the third most visited casino and resort destination in the state after Las Vegas and Reno, but a friendlier venue than its contemporaries.
Calico Ghost Town, a former silver-mining town in California founded in 1881 is administered by San Bernardino County as a museum park. The Ghost Walk to the former Knott’s Berry Farm preserved by Walter Knott since 1951 is unforgettable to my outdoor exploring party members for their acquired memory of the heroic miners who lived and toiled there in the Calico Mountains. Kingman, Ariz., where two buses for my party stopped off is the heart of Interstate 66. This clean town in Mojave County is said to be named after Lewis Kingman who surveyed along the Atlantic and Pacific Railroad’s right-of-way between Needles, Calif. and Albuquerque, N.M, passing nearby through residential areas of Kingman.
I heard the U.S. Bureau of Land Management handles public land in the Mojave Desert, a part of the ``crown jewel of the American West’s natural landscape conservation system. It has designated numerous large off-highway vehicles (OHVs) open use in areas of the Mojave Desert, including Johnson Valley in San Bernardino County, the world’s largest open OHV use area. OHVs include four-wheel-drive cars and trucks and can seemingly damage the fragile desert ecosystems.
Because of the Mojave Desert’s position sandwiched between high-tech and urban areas, I felt myself, there should be an increasing need to connect these areas by establishing right-to-work corridors along already-established routes and by regulating new road construction hereafter.
The writer is an outside director of Kunwha Pharmaceutical in Seoul. He can be reached at kexim2@unitel.co.kr.
<국문요지>
모하비사막 탐방 취재기
I. 탐방취지 - 미국서부지역 (지난 10월초 출신고 만남55주년 행사 일환)
순방 과정 중 모하비사막일대를 관찰 -> 많은 것을 보고, 배우고,
느낄 수 있었음.
II. 현지확인
1. 모하비사막은 미국서부 4개주 (CA. NV. UT. 및 AZ.)에 걸쳐있는
64,759 평방미터 (남한의 약 2/3 면적) 지역.
2. 모하비는 콜로라도강변의 사람들을 뜻하는 아메리칸인디안 용어.
3. 산과 분지가 연결되어있는 구릉지형으로 연간 강우량은 254mm정도.
4. 모하비사막의 영역은 북미남서쪽에 자생하는 “여호수아” 분포지역 전역
-> 19세기 중엽 모하비사막을 횡단한 모르몬교도들이 종교의식에
근거하여 붙여진 식물이름.
5. 생태계 및 거주민들의 수자원은 지하수, 모하비강, 콜로라도강에서 발원.
6. 모하비사막가운데로 Interstate 15, 40, Highway 58, 95, State
Route 14, 190 등 북미 주요간선도로 등이 관통 -> 동서 (시카고와 L.A.
구간)를 있던 향수어린 Interstate 66은 Interstate 40에 밀려 퇴색과정 ->
CA내의 Highway 58의 모하비마을 인근 일정구간은 “한국전쟁참전용사
추모의 길“로 명명되어 있음.
7. 대도시: 라스베가스 (L.V., 스페인어로 목초지를 뜻함) -> 애당초
지하수를 이용한 오아시스로 출발 -> 현재는 콜로라도강 인근의
미드호수의 수자원을 공급받아 활용하는 인구 2백만의 고도성장
오락휴양도시로 탈바꿈 함 -> 한국교민의 수도 2만 에 달함.
8. 군소도시들:
(가) 바스토우 - L.A.와 L.V.의 중간에 위치한 교통요지상업도시 ->
교포가 운영 하는 대규모 건강식품센터가 도심에 자리 잡고 있음;
(나) 라플린 - NV에서 L.V.와 리노에 이어 세 번째 오락휴양도시로 두 군데
보다 는 좀 더 가족친화적인 분위기임이 특징;
(다) 캐리코유령마을 - 과거 번영기 은광촌을 재현한 관광박물관공원으로
산버나디노카운티에서 관장;
(라) 킹맨 - Interstate 66의 중심지인 청결도시로 이 지역을 모하비사막의
교통요지로 조성함에 공헌한 루이스 킹맨의 성에서 작명된 도시.
III. 향후과제 - 미국국토관리국은 자원의 보고인 서부지역의 오염방지 및
생태계보호를 위한 과업실천 중 -> 첨단기술과 도시화의 중간에서
샌드위치입장에서 노력 -> OHV (고속도로 이외의 지역 진입차량) 운행의
적절한 허가, 규제, 제한 등 운영의 묘 발휘 필요.
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