Bulldozing the Albany Pine Bush

They paved paradise and put up a parking lot,
With a pink hotel, a boutique,
And a swinging hot spot.
Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone?

They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.
They took all the trees and put them in a tree museum.
And they charged all the people
A dollar and a half just to see ’em.

Don’t it always seem to go
That you don’t know what you’ve got till it’s gone?
They paved paradise and put up a parking lot.

They Paved Paradise and Put Up a Parking Lot

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9824448813_26ef2a3f20_oA few months ago I stumbled across this photo on the AlbanyGroup on Flickr. It is of the Northway Exit 1, shortly after it was constructed in the mid-1960s, prior to construction of Crossgates Mall.

The the Pine Bush at that time seems largely wild, although there are some newer housing subdivisions in the distance. The Northway and Thruway Interchange seem somewhat out of place, and once can only imagine what these wild lands must have looked like before these superhighways were overlaid over this area that once was mostly dirt roads, the wilds at the outskirts of the city.

Within a decade, much of this land would be filled in with Washington Avenue Extension’s many strip malls and Crossgates Mall. These wild lands would be lost, at least temporarily to parking lots, suburban office buildings, and shopping centers.

Similar scenes can be seen across more rural portions of New York. What happened in the Albany Pine Bush can happen anywhere.

Look now and speak up before it’s gone.

An old-1960s photo of the Northway and Rensselaer Lake reminds us what the Pine Bush looked like before it's heavy development, and is a warning for future generations.