Using GIS Analysis to Stop the Wilderness Wal-Mart

GIS 200

May 11, 2009

Executive Summary

Wal-Mart is planning to build a 141,000 square foot store in Orange, Virginia

The proposed store will be on land near the Wilderness, a historic Civil War battlefield

This project concludes that a Wal-Mart can be built three miles north of the proposed location and not affect the view from the Wilderness battlefield site

Why Preserve Battlefields?

Provides a tangible link to the past Provide an opportunity to attract visitors Requires no costly infrastructure Nonrenewable resource Increases quality of life Prevents urban sprawl

"The Wilderness is an indelible part of our history, its very ground hallowed by the American blood spilled there, and it cannot be moved … Surely Wal-Mart can identify a site that would meet its needs without changing the very character of the battlefield.” – James McPherson, Pulitzer Prize winning historian

Battle of the Wilderness

Principal Commanders for the U.S. Federal Government (US): Lt. General Ulysses S. Grant and Major Gen. George G. Meade

Principal Commander for the Confederate States of America (CS): General Robert E. Lee

Forces Engaged: 162,920 total (US: 101,895; CS: 61,025) Estimated Casualties: 29,800 total (US: 18,400; CS: 11,400) Opening battle of Grant’s sustained offensive against the Confederate Army

of Northern Virginia, known as the Overland Campaign The Overland Campaign was the bloodiest campaign in American history

and the turning point in the war in the eastern theatre Resulted in a tactical draw Grant did not retreat and the Federals advanced toward the crossroads of

Spotsylvania Courthouse

Battle of the WildernessMay 5-7, 1864

Orange, Virginia and Surrounding Counties

National Park Boundaries

The Wilderness, Then and Now

Orange County, Virginia Zoning

Parkland Under Threat of Development

Protected Land

Proposed Wal-Mart Location

Other Threatened Land

Other Regional Wal-Marts

Compromise Location

The Future?A proposed Wal-Mart Supercenter near a hallowed Civil War site in Virginia is headed to local planners next month. A developer has submitted revised plans for the store in Orange County. The Planning Commission will consider the plans at its next meeting, on May 7, and a public airing is expected May 21. Supervisors will have the final say. Historians from New England to California have criticized Wal-Mart’s plan to build within a cannon shot of the battlefield where the troops of Gens. Robert E. Lee and Ulysses S. Grant first clashed. For its part, Wal-Mart says the site is zoned for commercial use and the store would not diminish the battlefield.