Cohousing-L Mailing List: Re: fireplaces

[MLYNCHIN (MLYNCHIN]

In a message dated 03.18.98 7:44:29 PM, you wrote:

<<How about gas fireplaces ?
They do provide quite a bit of heat without much pollution.
>>

At first gas fireplaces turned some people off as an imitation fireplace that
one would find in the chi chi restaurants and nixed it. But I have since
thought about it and now might entertain a fireplace only if it is gas because
it would be cleaner and less maintenance in terms of ashes and wood stocking.

The original fireplace discussion was to have it in the common house. Anti-
fireplace people not only do not want it for its detrimental environmental
effects, but if it's in the common house, it would be community expense and
maintenance which nonusers did not want. Once a fireplace is in, it's in when
that space could have been allocated for something else; and it was debatable
whether it would be used as much as in one's cozy unit. Remember, it is not
that cold here, nor for very long.

Burning wood is toxic. I didn't have to live through the Oakland Firestorm to
realize that. I didn't have to go camping in Zion where all the campers
(mostly foreign tourists) bought wood to burn at their campsites to get that
campfire experience even though the temperature was in the 80's. I ddn't enjoy
star gazing that night because it was too smoky.

Marilyn
Old Oakland