The Salt Line, Vol. 4: Birds, Barons, and a Department of Transportation Having a Lie-Down
Welcome back to The Salt Line, the only coastal news roundup that reads your local headlines so you can spend that time doing something more productive — like watching a hummingbird commute to Alaska.
The Bird Quit. It Just Quit.
Researchers down in Baldwin County strapped a tiny tracker to a ruby-throated hummingbird and watched it fly from Alabama all the way to Alaska. That is not a metaphor, that is a real thing that happened.
Let’s put that in perspective: this bird weighs less than a nickel, has a brain the size of a Tic-Tac, and it mapped a multi-thousand-mile interstate corridor without a single public comment period, an environmental study, or a three-year postponement. Meanwhile, keep reading, because we’ve got a Florida transportation agency down here that couldn’t figure out which direction a road goes. The hummingbird did it on vibes and flower juice.
Scientists call this “remarkable migratory behavior.” I call it showing off.
FDOT: We’ve Thought About It and Our Answer Is Nevermind
The Florida Department of Transportation has officially scrapped its plan to convert MLK Jr. Drive and Davis Highway into two-way streets in Pensacola. The agency spent considerable time studying whether cars could go in two directions on a road — a concept successfully piloted in most of the known world — and landed on: no, actually, forget it.
To be fair to FDOT, two-way streets are extremely complicated. You’ve got cars going this way, and then other cars going that way, and nobody has ever truly proven that both things can happen simultaneously. The hummingbird probably could have sorted it out in a long weekend, but she’s busy.
A Fish Named Peach Is Not the Problem Here
The Pensacola Blue Wahoos split a doubleheader with the Birmingham Barons on Wednesday — won the first game 6-4, lost the nightcap 6-3 — after Tuesday’s game was rained out entirely and rescheduled as a twin bill because the Gulf Coast refuses to be convenient.
Here is what I love about minor league baseball: the team name is “Blue Wahoos.” Their opponents are called the “Barons,” which sounds like a team owned by a railroad tycoon in 1887. The Wahoos blew a late lead in game two, which, combined with a Biloxi Shuckers loss, shook up the standings. I just want you to sit with the sentence “a Biloxi Shuckers loss matters here.” This whole stretch of coastline is absolutely unhinged and I would not change a thing.
A Whale Walks Into Gulf Shores
Marine life artist Wyland — world-famous, one name, like Cher but with more dolphins — is coming to Gulf Shores this weekend to unveil a new public art installation. Wyland is known for massive, sweeping murals of whales and ocean life painted on the sides of buildings, which is the correct scale at which to appreciate the Gulf of Mexico.
There is something genuinely great about a town on the water inviting an artist to paint more water on it. Gulf Shores looks at the actual ocean directly in front of it and says: yes, but bigger, and on a wall. Respect.
Baldwin County Would Like You to Have a Plan
Baldwin County officials this week urged residents to prepare for hazardous weather by having a plan for when to leave and where to go. This is, genuinely, solid advice on the Alabama Gulf Coast in June, a month where the atmosphere routinely decides it has had enough.
If you need a plan, might I suggest: go somewhere with two-way streets and a hummingbird tracker.
That’s your Salt Line for June 18th. Stay watered, stay weird, and remember — if a three-gram bird can make it to Alaska, you can make it to Wednesday.
— Sully