Dear Editor,
So the folks at Viad/Brewster celebrate their vision that gilding our mountain park lilies with glass walkways will “put people in a unique sense of place...” Really? I found that vision so perversely disgusting that I needed to leave the country for opening day to avoid becoming violently ill.
Visiting Rome, I try to imagine trying to “connect people in a way they have not been able to do” in the imperial forum by stretching an elevated glass gimmick from the Arch of Titus to the Temple of Vesta. There probably is not a single visitor to Rome (ever) who would find that a good idea. Not even Alaric and his pillaging Visigoths. But Visigoths were not Viads.
But I found a glass sidewalk in Italy after all.
Beneath the streets of Assisi lie the remnants of a Roman forum and temple dedicated to Minerva. The new glass walkway allows visitors to see the walls and columns of the forum, while viewing the floor and water passages beneath their feet.
What a unique concept! Installing a glass walkway to actually PROTECT a treasured cultural resource while allowing visitors better and more respectful access. But then again, this is the Temple of Minerva, not the Temple of the Venal Viad.
Jim Pissot
Canmore, Alta.
