The High Coast: Toward an Altitudinal Economy of Snow

Abstract

As avant-garde interface between geologic and meteorologic media, highaltitude montane and alpine zones constitute a “High Coast” delimiting a massive, diffuse, yet largely unrecognized freshwater “ocean”: the snowpack. In the western United States, up to 80% of water resources draw from the snowpack of the Rockies, Sierra Nevadas, and other ranges; accordingly, snow has critically shaped geotechnical systems of regional urbanization, both up- and down-slope. The infrastructural components of such systems express the vernacular geographies of economy and ecology unique to each altitudinal and orographic (mountain) range, from snow-fences to forestry patterns. The highly varied coupling of components evidences decentralized yet systematic territorial management of snow across multiple spatio-temporal scales. Reimaging snow as theoretical and material ground for geotechnical praxis (following Patrick Geddes, Lewis Mumford, and Benton MacKaye), this project proposes a speculative thermodynamic narrative for a set of sites in California, Nevada, and Utah, exploring the potentials and implications of a “Big Melt” for the High Coast.

Keywords

Snow / Geotechnics / Thermodynamics / General Economy / Remote Urbanization

RIGHTS & PERMISSIONS

Higher Education Press