Month: December 2016

  • Ladysmith

    A few weeks ago I wrote about Triangle, a name on a road sign that I pondered as I sat stuck in traffic on a drive back from Richmond, Virginia. I also noticed another exit on that fateful trip as I slogged through miles of gridlock. The sign said Ladysmith and my mind began to…

  • Merry Christmas

    A Merry Christmas to everyone reading Twelve Mile Circle who celebrates the day. A Happy Holiday or well wishes to everyone else as well. Every once in awhile the 12MC publishing schedule falls directly on Christmas. So a Christmas theme felt appropriate even with a diminished audience. Ironically, most people with enough time to read…

  • Crystal City

    Familiar place names always catch my attention. Often they share a bond with locations near my home in the Washington, DC area. Several years ago I wrote about one such situation in A Tale of Three Ridges. This time Crystal City served as the common denominator. Crystal City, Virginia Virginia’s Crystal City abuts Ronald Reagan…

  • Better Geographic Portmanteaus

    Longtime readers of Twelve Mile Circle know that I love a good portmanteau, the smooshing together of two distinct words to form a new word that combines their meaning. These occur geographically too. My favorite examples involve the adjacent towns of Mexicali and Calexico on the border between Mexico and the U.S. state of California.…

  • Ends of Canada

    My Ends of the Earth wandering reminded me of an earlier Google Street View quest. A long time ago, way back in 2010, Twelve Mile Circle included an article I called The Shack at the End of the Road. This marked the northernmost extreme of Street View coverage in Canada at that time. I wondered…

  • Ends of the Earth

    I revisited an old concept from a much earlier version of Twelve Mile Circle, the simple pleasure of wandering aimlessly through Google Street View. That’s something I used to enjoy regularly. However, life got busier and other priorities mostly prevented that luxury in recent years. They still do, although I needed to clear my mind…

  • Centers of Michigan

    For once I wasn’t looking for the geographic center of something, as problematic as that could be given various definitions. Not in Michigan. And for the record, the town of St. Louis claimed to be the “middle of the mitten.” Even so, this moves to a spot a few miles north-northwest of Cadillac taking the…

  • Wildlife Corridors

    Wildlife corridors do exactly what they imply. They provide safe passage for animals. Devices like these became increasingly important as pristine wilderness succumbed to development or urbanization. Without them animal populations became isolated even if protected within parks. This impacted genetic diversity and the overall health of local species. Further problems occurred when animals tried…

  • Newsworthy River Cutoffs

    Rivers can make great boundaries when they cooperate. Frequently they do not. These creatures of nature flow where they want to flow. Sometimes they erode deep furrows through solid rock, changing course only after eons pass. Other times they cross alluvial plains, shifting into multiple ephemeral streams simply awaiting the next flood. Problems will undoubtedly…