Source: http://www.nicaraguadispatch.com/blogs-opinion/save-it-or-pave-it/3926
By 2013, Costa Rica will have completed the building of its ecologically disastrous, 100-mile road along the south bank of the wild and beautiful Río San Juan. Inaugurated by Costa Rican president Laura Chinchilla on Feb. 17, 2012 and costing approximately $20 million, at places the hideous scar in the landscape is less than 30 feet from the river.
As you head downriver look to the left towards the Nicaraguan side and you see what is considered the largest expanse of virgin lowland rain forest north of the Amazon basin. In the branches of trees reaching upwards of 100-feet and beneath the protected jungle canopy live more than 600 species of birds of every size and hue – fantastically decorated toucans, macaws and parrots among them. In addition, the Nicaraguan riverside reserve shelters 200 species of mammals such as jaguars, howler, white-face and spider monkeys, as well as rare orchids and a rainbow of brilliant butterflies. This is still the “Unpeopled Paradise” that Mark Twain witnessed and wrote about during his travels in Nicaragua in 1867.
Look to your right and the Costa Rican river bank is denuded of forests as far as you can see and is largely populated with farms, fields of crops and roaming cattle. Center stage in your view is a large, bare swath of earth that slashes through the landscape and teams of earth-movers and bulldozers who are churning and beating down the soil and rolling out the highway.
The overwhelming sense is one of loss, helplessness and sadness as your mind begins to absorb the enormity of what is transpiring and what it says about the contrasting environmental priorities and philosophies. You can only find relief from the road’s stark reality by placing yourself in the boat so that you are always facing the Nicaraguan side. Thankfully, the road is not as yet complete and the Río San Juan returns to its natural state about two hours before it empties into the Caribbean at San Juan de Nicaragua.
It seems the times they have changed and Costa Rican president Laura Chinchilla and her ministers have declared war on the environment. And, to what end?
