Just north of
Golden Gate Fields in
Albany,
California lies a true human occupied landfill. Known locally as the Bulb, this abandoned
landfill reaches out into the
San Francisco Bay, and until fairly recently, was home to many
human beings. The
ground, if you can call if that, is composed entirely of
rubble. Crushed
concrete woven with rusty
rebar,
slag, and
clay and
glass shards mingle with broken
brick,
timbers and occasional
sheetmetal to form the
penninsula itself. Everything that grows there grows because it was dumped or blew in, or drifted in on the
tide.
Scotch broom and
anise plants predominate, with grasses and the occasional
cypress or
palm. The Bulb is traced by trails, up the small
ridge, then to either side,
north and
south, then down and around and back again. You can't get lost out there. Well, in the daytime you can't, and when there's no
fog. As
living somewhere not enclosed by four walls became more and more
illegal in California, the homeless of Albany and
the surrounding areas were
pushed out,
west, toward the
sea. Across the
freeway, away from the manicured parks and underpasses, they congregated. Attracted, perhaps, by the clean air, the quiet, the unobstructed views of the Golden Gate,
San Francisco, and
Mt. Tamalpais, or maybe by the wealth of washed-up and stacked-up
building materials, they stayed. Quite an
enclave for a while there, they built houses, castles,
subterranean chambers supplied for
hard times. They built
watchtowers,
sculptures and bridges and campfire circles. Beached boats, washed up in long-forgotten storms, became homes to a few. Nestled together in the mud of a small cove, they'd float and rock a bit in high
tides. The landfill was home to many folk,
homesteaded in the American tradition, built from the
refuse of the larger
society. The landfill gradually attracted notice. Some would soil the nest, bringing
police in after one scofflaw or another.
Art work began appearing. On the north end of the Bulb, at water's edge, huge paintings on splintered
plywood, wooden
flotsam, were erected. Brightly colored, they recall latin american retablos, populated with figures and events and words somehow familiar. More sculpture grew, on the
shore and up above, in the
amphitheatre. Local folk interested in alternatives to the established
social order in the
Bay Area began to venture out to the landfill to
camp, to hang out and barbeque and play
music. Parties were staged in the amphitheatre, an enclosed depression in the land a little north of center of the place. The amphitheatre is a
sculpture garden in itself, a fence of rusted bicycles encloses the unwalled side, the walls slabs of
reinforced concrete stacked haphazardly with rebar tangles inviting adornment. A huge rebar
angel, head thrown back in ecstatic
flight, stands guard over the site. An unbroken
slab of concrete serves as a
stage,
backdrop the
bay, the
sunset, the mountain of
Marin County in the distance, rising behind the storage tanks of the
Standard Oil refinery in
Richmond. The amphitheatre has hosted a variety of events,
Critical Mass Berkeley finds itself there once a
year, still, for a free
food and noize extravaganza held after the
action itself. The amphitheatre survives. In earlier days, the residents of the Bulb would wander out to the parties there, joining the punks and artists in food and revelry.
Gradually, Albany became aware of the
community in its midst, created by their own inattention to the needs of human beings, and as any capitalistic
society would, they chose to drive these non-producers from their homes. There were a series of round-ups, similar to
cattle drives, with police combing the Bulb, rousting individuals, confiscating their belongings, storing these
folks in trailers in the racetrack parking lots and throwing them in
jail if they tried to return to their homes on this discarded
land.
Lawsuits were filed, time marched on, and people drifted off. Albany provides no services for the homeless, no
legal place to lay a head, and had to
justify the uprooting of this community. A park. Of course, it will be a
park, where law-abiding folk can walk their dogs.
Environmental studies begin,
methane pools are tapped, art is documented and the residents are gone. Mostly.
Rumor has it that they never found Mad Mike. His home, on a
bluff overlooking the southern beaches is surrounded by a sea of smashed concrete blocks. A path winds over the surface, a path of blocks laid in order somehow, tons of concrete muscled into place by one
man. Below this, in the rubble, are said to lie Mike's paths, tunnels, secret bunkers he disappears into when anyone from the outside arrives. His home has a rooftop
patio, and the suits of cards laid out in the
yard in
gravel mosaic. His view rivals that of any million dollar home.
These are my own observations. Much info is available online about the Albany Landfill. Google search that term for documentation of many facets of this place.