God created the world, but Americans made Liminal Spaces

TOPOS on the Road by Ian Witte

Figure 1: Underpass near downtown Baton Rouge. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Perhaps you’ve heard of the phrase, “God created the world, but the Dutch made The Netherlands”. With every square meter planned and designed, the Dutch left traces of human presence in every corner of their country which, arguably, created an abundance of liminal spaces to be found. After all, very often are liminal spaces linked to signs of human interventions in the landscape.

Now, the Dutch are not the only people fond of scaping their land. As it turns out, Americans seem to enjoy it too. I must admit that my modest European mind was amazed by the vast scale of American engineering when I visited the Gulf Coast in February 2025. It was an excursion for my thesis – to learn how the Americans apply ‘Building with Nature’ to save the world’s fastest eroding coastline. And my destination? The very frontier of the Mississippi delta, at approximately 25 travel hours from Wageningen. This one-week journey took me along many places that left me astonished by just how liminal and brutal American spaces can be. I captured these experiences in this article – a collection of spaces that are to some degree liminal.

The journey started with the trans-Atlantic crossing. Because flights from Schiphol to Louisiana have inconvenient connections and are crazily expensive, I opted for the direct route to Houston, Texas. This 11-hour flight passed over parts of the Midwest – a region covering a dozen states that are known for their endlessly sprawling farmland (figure 2). It is a seemingly perfect array of fields following the latitudinal and longitudinal grid that far exceeds the scope of the well-known Dutch polders. I can only presume that the experience from ground level is as liminal as it is from above.

Figure 2: Aerial view over farmland in the Midwest. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

After getting off the plane and passing customs, I was surprised to see a subway station sign. Why? According to Wikipedia, the Houston metropolitan area is among the most populous in the United States – and it does not have a metro system. As it turns out, that comes at the exception of the airport itself. The facility is so large that parking lots and terminals are connected by overground and underground railway lines. These small trains are driverless and are also referred to as ‘people movers’ (figure 3). Especially the underground line was so short that the distance between stations could easily be covered on foot, on the walkway between the rubber tracks. It made me feel like I was in a forgotten section of the backrooms, rather than an actual metro system.

Figure 3: “Subway” underneath Houston’s airport. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Next up was the journey from Houston to Baton Rouge, Louisiana’s state capital. There was no train connection, so my only option was the bus. The six-hour route followed Interstate 10. Vast distances of this highway cross swampland, which both holds a valuable ecosystem and has high risks of both coastal and fluvial flooding. As such, the highway is built on viaducts, the longest of which stretching in an almost unobstructed straight line for nearly thirty kilometres (figure 4). I can only imagine the amount of resources it would take to build and maintain such a structure.

Figure 4: I10 highway viaduct, west of New Orleans.( Source: Ray Devlin, 2008)

After Baton Rouge, the next stretch of the route passed along Lake Pontchartrain – the lake that borders New Orleans. It is a lake so big that the distant shore was barely visible. Right as we passed by Pontchartrain on the I10, a powerline passed overhead and entered the lake, crossing right through to the distant horizon (figure 5). Interestingly, I later came across several web pages using this powerline to counter flat earth theories, as it disappears beyond the curve. 

Figure 5: powerlines in Lake Pontchartrain. (Source: M. West, 2017)

Speaking of surrealism, the final stretch of my trip felt as though it was a venture to the end of the world. Most of the journey passed through flat marshlands that seemed to stretch beyond the visible horizon in any direction (figure 6). Much of the land is abandoned, and a lot of it had been turned into water over the past decades. Destroyed homes and dead trees litter the landscape, as well as the occasional lost wreck or container brought into the marsh by one of the bygone hurricanes. But then, after the final three-hour drive, I finally made it. Grand Isle, a small island settlement bordering the Gulf. Where I thought I had reached the frontier of civilization, I was proven entirely wrong. There, as I stood on the beach, I witnessed dozens, if not hundreds of offshore oil rigs on the horizon (figure 7). Day and night, these pumps work tirelessly to empty one of the larger American petroleum fields – the very source that keeps a large part of America moving.

Figure 6: Louisiana’s marshlands. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Figure 7: Hundreds of petroleum facilities can be seen from Louisiana’s barrier island beaches. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

After witnessing all the local conservation measures and speaking to involved experts, it was finally time to head back to Houston. I had precisely one day to spare before my flight home – the perfect opportunity to witness and experience one of the pinnacles of American planning with my own eyes. The intention was to do it all on foot; from Museum Park through the suburbs to a commercial centre, then to Downtown before finally heading back to my accommodation. Before heading out, I’d hear my host urge, “Be careful going out on foot,” and “Don’t stay out at night.” After coming back, he’d yell in surprise, “You walked all the way to Target!?” Yes I did, and it was even shorter than it takes to walk from the Wageningen Rhine beach to the WUR Campus. It just pains my Dutch heart that car-dependent culture and crime risks make it almost impossible to enjoy a safe walkable neighbourhood, both day and night.

I must admit that the first part of my city walk was not as bad as I imagined. Sure, cars were in abundance, but so was the greenery from people’s private properties. The suburb felt alive on that Saturday, with people simply enjoying their free time both out on the streets and in their gardens, especially in places with less intrusion from road traffic. At one point I was actually getting comfortable. But then, all of a sudden, the street I followed turned into a bridge, where the quaintness disappeared. It was a sunken highway which would certainly have felt liminal if not for all the cars speeding by (figure 8).

Figure 8: Sunken highway cutting right through one of Houston’s suburbs. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Along most of my walk through Houston, the city’s skyline towered over the streets and houses (figure 9). It was visible from practically anywhere and made it very simple to orient myself. An often heard critique of American cities is that the skyscrapers in downtown are often so generic that all modern American cities look the same. Perhaps it strengthens national identity, but it surely does not contribute to local or regional identities.

Figure 9: Skyscrapers forming the Houston skyline. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

The closer I got to downtown, the more asphalt took over green spaces. It was some 26 degrees Celsius on that day in February, meaning it would get so much hotter in summer. I was relieved to finally pass by a proper green space again – Buffalo Bayou. It is one of the major green spaces in the city, with the term ‘bayou’ referring to a small river that functions as water discharge for extreme weather events. It was a beautiful park for much of the length, where locals seemed to enjoy their free time while all the open space rendered a great view over the skyline, now much closer by. However, it did not take long for the quaintness and picturesqueness of the park to be disturbed by road infrastructure. Where the path was once sheltered by plants, it suddenly ran underneath a viaduct (figure 10). To make matters worse, a massive highway interchange was built right over the park, shortly before downtown (figure 11). At one point you could not even call it a park anymore, because everything was concrete (figure 12).

Figure 10: Walking path right underneath a major road. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Figure 11: Highway obstructing the view of the downtown skyscrapers. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Figure 12: Buffalo Bayou hidden underneath several levels of highway. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

Perhaps my biggest shock of all came when I finally reached downtown. I imagined that would be where all the locals would gather to go out or relax. Never could I have been more wrong. The streets downtown were completely deserted – both from people and cars. Roads sometimes up to eight lanes wide, were nearly empty. No one used the tram (there are just three lines in the city, and, ironically, they are called the metro). Downtown was simply an awful place to be. Strong winds poured down the valleys, where skyscrapers stood like fortresses along the sidewalks, with little to no integrated connection to the street (figure 13). As the sun went down, it felt cold, dark, and intimidating. The only people on the streets were either homeless or gangster. That, while the public spaces downtown seemed like the only spaces in the city that received proper maintenance and investment.

Figure 13: (Almost) deserted streets downtown. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)

I just could not bend my mind around the fact that the centre of the city is the place everyone rather avoids. All the life was concentrated in the suburbs – near people’s homes, or in the few nice streets where there are still some small-scale cafes, restaurants or ice cream shops. There are a few parks around that also attract lots of locals. One of the nicest experiences I had was shortly before I headed back to the airport – a Japanese garden (figure 14). It was full of people enjoying their time, showing just what they seek in their cities. Deep down I hope for them that public spaces all over the United States receive better investments and improvements, even if that means having to un-make some liminal spaces.

Figure 14: Japanese garden near Museum Park. (Source: Ian Witte, 2025)