Truck Tales, Part One
The 'Free City Bus Service'
originally published December 20, 2006
Jason Crosby
Back in May of last year, I decided to try my hand at long-distance truck driving. My job as an adjunct college instructor left me unemployed during the summer, and under-employed the rest of the year. I needed more income and it seemed the trucking industry was always looking for drivers.
Truck driving wasn’t just a flip-of-the-coin choice. Back when I was in my 20s, before the days of the Commercial Driver’s License (CDL), I had driven a truck for an air freight forwarding company; shuttling cargo between customers and the major airports around New York City.
My “territory” was northern New Jersey, and the freight came to or went out from Newark, Kennedy and La Guardia and occasionally Philadelphia Airports.
Learning to guide the 26-foot truck through the narrow traffic-clogged streets of Newark, Patterson and Jersey City, as well all the boroughs of New York City, was a skill that didn’t come easily, but stayed with me.
A few years later, after I moved to Georgia, I got a freelance job driving empty rental trucks from all over the Southeast back to the metro New York area. Rather than having the trucks sit in a Southern rental lot and gather dust, the company paid to have them driven back to the bustling Northeast where they were in high demand.
As a “contractor,” I was paid 10 cents a mile and reimbursed for fuel. When I dropped the trucks off, I was also given the cost of a plane ticket back to Atlanta. If I really pushed it, I could make two trips a week. Drivers were given phony “rental contracts” and were told to never travel in groups. I suspect the whole endeavor was illegal and violated the road use tax laws of every state I drove through.
After several trips, I formed what writer Evan "Rick" Baker called the “Free-City Bus Service.” The premise was simple: if I saw a hitchhiker or even a group of hitchhikers, I would pick them up. This was the mid-'70s, so there was never a shortage of “passengers.” The only condition I had was they rode in back in the cargo box.
On one particular run, Evan had come with me and at various places on the way I had stopped to pick folks up. By 3 a.m., we were on the southern end of the New Jersey Turnpike with a hippie couple, two GIs, a wandering musician and two winos heading to New York City.
It was just then that an eager state trooper, obviously lured by the sight of two hippies in a large rental truck cruising through the Jersey night, decided to pull me over and check things out. They never used the word “profiling” in those days, but having long hair automatically made you suspect of a laundry list of high crimes and misdemeanors.
The trooper dutifully checked my license and the bogus rental agreement and asked me where I was going.
“New York,” I replied.
He seemed to grin and develop a twinkle in his eye when he asked me what I was hauling and I told him, “Nothing, sir.”
Visions of drug-bust heaven seemed to dance in his head, and he started to grin from ear to ear when I told him I didn’t mind at all opening the back and letting him look for himself.
I slowly raised the door, and the higher up it went, the lower his jaw dropped.
It seems that during the trip, the hippie couple had pitched a tent toward the back of the box where they were now engaged in what could best be described as “Wild Monkey Sex.” The two winos were passed out on either side of a small mound of empty “Wild Russian Vanya Wine” bottles. The wandering musician and the two GIs were engaged in a tuneful rendition of “Kumbaya” - all under the pale glow of a Coleman electric lantern. The trooper stood stunned, transfixed, flabbergasted. He seemed to stutter and sputter for several seconds before he finally stammered out “What the hell is this?!”
“They were hitchhiking. I gave them a ride,” I quietly replied.
“You can’t do that! Are you crazy? You can’t just run around with people in a truck like this.”
“Okay, I’ll make them get out.”
“You need to do exactly that,” he responded in his best command voice.
“But then they’ll be here hitchhiking on your turnpike,” I observed as I nodded my head toward the group to emphasize the point.
There was a long silent pause as the trooper looked back and forth between me and the group. His shoulders seemed to slump resignedly.
“Well, okay then. Go on, get the hell out of here,” he said.
As I started around to the cab of the truck he called me back, looking me straight in the eye.
“Don’t EVER let me catch you doing this again!”
A Village in the Woods
The Orange Twin Conservation Community Moves Ahead
originally published December 20, 2006
On Dec. 6, the Athens-Clarke County Commission unanimously approved the final plans for development of the Orange Twin Conservation Community (or OTCC) with surprisingly enthusiastic support. After years of working with the local Planning Department, the members of Orange Twin finally achieved their first critical goal with full backing from the county. There was also notable public support from the surrounding neighborhood. They now open their doors to potential shareholders and homebuilders interested in participating in the development of a community based on conservation and sustainable living. Sitting on over 155 acres of Georgia piedmont forest - most of which is undeveloped and in Athens-Clarke’s greenbelt - the land will become the site of 45 clustered homes lining pedestrian thoroughfares throughout two separate villages, with 20 acres reserved for organic farming and a 100-acre conservation easement.
The Land
John d'Azzo
An existing pavilion in the woods at Orange Twin.
In 1999, Barbara Denvir discovered a newspaper ad about a piece of land being put up for sale. It had been vacant and untouched for 40 years, having once been used for cotton farming in the 19th century and later in the 1960s as a privately-owned Girl Scout camp. Recalls Denvir: “It was amazing and beautiful, much more than I was looking for, with many surprises - and it was cheap.” Denvir, along with Laura Carter and Laura Glenn, scouted the old roads, eventually finding an existing swimming hole and pavilion. A year later, others discovered the remnants of a family cemetery along one of the pathways.
The three tracts of land are home to deer, mountain laurel, hardwood forest, and chanterelle mushrooms (which blossom from the roots of white oaks during summer months). Two converging streams cascade through the terrain: Noketchee Creek, which comes from the north, and Helican Springs, which comes from the east and flows through an existing swimming hole. The tracts were purchased in the spring of 2000.
The Vision
John d'Azzo
The farmhouse at Orange Twin. Part of the house was rescued from demolition on Jonas Avenue in Athens in 2005.
“It started as a community of friends…. We had the idea before we ever found the land,” says Laura Carter, who signed the initial holding check. “Laura Glenn and I are both adamant about the way kids get to grow up: not in front of a television set.” Specific criteria then emerged from their shared values: “30 acres, woods, a water source, somewhere 15 minutes from downtown, preferably bikeable.” After finding a plot of land five times larger than what they initially wanted, the vision of the community changed. Says Carter, “We came up with a new plan to work environmentally, economically, spiritually…”
Today, OTCC is run by a board of trustees and includes elected president Carter, a vice president, treasurer and clerk. The diverse group of individuals making up the board of 21 trustees includes artists, lawyers, musicians, editors and architects. The Orange Twin vision combines community with nature, art and agriculture. Its concept draws from such influences as Bill Mollison’s forward-thinking work on permaculture as well as the do-it-yourself spirit of the independent music scene in Athens.
Creating eco-villages is not a new idea, even in the South: The Farm in Tennessee is one of the oldest eco-villages in the United States. As for the OTCC, their presence is one which has been long awaited in the diverse Athens community.
The Plan
John d'Azzo
And aerial view sketch from the southwest of the Smokey Road village site, one of two village sites planned for the Orange Twin Conservation Community.
With help from architect Phil Hawes, UGA professor Allen Stovall, and cofounder of Village Habitat Design Greg Ramsey, the members of Orange Twin are preparing to realize the creation of a pedestrian-based eco-village supported by solar power. “I like to think we owe it to humanity,” says John d’Azzo, Orange Twin’s head planner/ design scientist, who, with Laura Carter, was responsible for getting the plan through the Planning and ACC Commissions.
Located on Noketchee Creek Road in Athens, the eco-village will contain two pedestrian-based communities: Smokey Road and Noketchee Creek. Their basic layouts will contain dense clusters of south-facing single- and multi-family residences placed in the least environmentally sensitive areas. Connecting the residences will be gathering areas and community-owned facilities to include artist studios, a pedestrian boulevard, sports fields and two amphitheaters. The amphitheaters, located in natural depressions in the existing terrain, will be used as outdoor theaters with stages and parks for recreational activities. “The sculpted, terraced terrain will also serve as an erosion-control device as it slows down and captures stormwater before it eventually flows into the detention pond below,” d’Azzo explains. The community will overlook its own agricultural production area, thus, he says, “visually connecting the inhabitants to the land.”
For more information regarding the Orange Twin Conservation Community, contact Laura Carter at village@orangetwin.com, or visit www.orangetwin.com.
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