Quieter Earth Day Expected This Year

Last year, from Pasadena’s Arroyo Seco to New York’s Central Park, Earth Day ranked as a major event, drawing millions to gatherings marked by varying degrees of celebrity hoopla and hype.

Earth Day, 1991, promises to be a quieter affair.

“Last year, the big media ‘theme of the month’ was ‘Earth Day--20th Anniversary.’ This year, it’s ‘War!’ and ‘We won!’ ”, said Tim Brick, coordinator of Pasadena’s Arroyo Seco Earth Festival, which will be held Saturday on 950 acres surrounding Brookside Park and the Rose Bowl.

Earth Day has been relegated to a smaller role on the national and local agenda. The city of Pasadena, for example, is only providing half as much support to the Arroyo Seco Earth Festival this year. But it is hardly passing unnoticed.

The San Gabriel Valley will be the setting for festivals, hikes, tree-appreciation talks and bike races both before and after the “official” Earth Day, which will be observed Monday.

The premier event is the Arroyo Seco Earth Festival, with music, storytelling, an environmental film festival and 14 “villages” dedicated to different topics, from transportation to recycling.

The villages will be linked by biking and hiking trails. Transportation to the festival will be by shuttle buses from parking lots at Parsons Corp. at Walnut Street and Fair Oaks Avenue, and the Jet Propulsion Laboratory lot near Oak Grove Park on Pasadena’s border with La Canada Flintridge.

The day will start early, 6:45 a.m., for those registering for a five-kilometer foot race. The activities, which will end at 5 p.m., also include bicycle instruction and races, including “The Mayor’s Challenge,” with Pasadena Mayor Jess Hughston.

The city of Pasadena has cut in half its financial support for the festival this year, down from $100,000 in staff time and cash, Brick said. But the Pasadena festival coordinator said he believes no other city is playing such a strong role in this year’s Earth Day.

Among the other events planned in the San Gabriel Valley are:

Volunteers in Sierra Madre, starting at 8 a.m. Saturday in Mira Monte Park, will repair the oldest of the trails up Mt. Wilson. Also Saturday, West Covina will sponsor a five-hour celebration at its Civic Center, 1444 W. Garvey Ave., beginning at 10 a.m.

In San Marino, a hair salon called The Arrangement will stage a “Cut-A-Thon” on Sunday, donating the proceeds from reduced-rate $20 haircuts to a national tree planting effort. The Huntington Library, Art Collections and Botanical Gardens will sponsor “a celebration of trees” from 10:30 a.m. to 4:30 p.m. on Monday.

Plaza Pasadena is using Earth Day to announce on Monday the start of a recycling program that will recirculate from the mall each year 3,900 cubic yards of corrugated cardboard boxes--more than enough to cover the Rose Bowl’s playing field three feet deep from end to end.

And on Tuesday, officials in San Dimas, where the mayor has proclaimed April “Earth Month,” will plant two jacaranda trees.