In the aftermath of Veishea 2013, students traveling across Central Campus might notice the poor condition of that serene, picturesque, award-winning lawn. Unfortunately, the past several months of renovating Curtiss Hall has turned formerly — and precariously — grassy parts of the lawn around Curtiss and Ross Halls into dirt. Although there are several damaged spots around Central Campus, that area in particular looks like a small-scale no-man’s-land between entrenchments at the Battle of the Somme.

The lunches on Central Campus held last week during Veishea, like the lunches held there during Homecoming, also damaged the integrity of the lawn. Although the cold spell of weather that has persisted until late April this year has certainly not helped the grass thrive, it would be an untenable position to deny that hundreds of human feet walking over the same path day after day, standing in lines, has been the main cause of stunted growth there.

Mulching the most high-traffic areas and placing broad particleboard pieces on the ground for people to walk on has not helped, nor has the university’s practice of allowing motorized vehicles, such as golf carts and gators, to drive on and tear up the particularly vulnerable ground that abuts the sidewalks.

As the Veishea and Homecoming committees surely are already planning next year’s events, a good thing to consider would be their environmental impact on the environment that immediately surrounds us all, that Iowa State takes pride in, and that the Office of Admissions shows off to prospective students. Like the buildings around campus that provide places to study and socialize, Central Campus is an investment.

Unlike buildings, however, which are not made out of living things, ensuring that Central Campus is a grassy, tree-accented green space is a more time consuming proposition. Additionally, destroying the work that goes into maintaining Central Campus is a much easier task than creating it.

One possible resolution to this problem that has resulted from environmental unconsciousness could be a simple repositioning of the tents used to host the lunches. Instead of siting the tents on either the north or south side of the sidewalk that connects Beardshear and Curtiss Halls, the Veishea and Homecoming committees might place the tents to be used tor lunches over the sidewalks. If the tents straddled a walkway that was already paved and the tables used to serve lunch were right up to the sidewalk, some of the damage probably would be mitigated.

There might be a couple concerns with that simple solution. One could object that people needing to cross Central Campus would find their way obstructed. There are, however, several routes across Central Campus, all of which are easy to find. Additionally, there is nothing wrong with blazing one’s own trail across, preferring to tread on grass rather than cement.

Or, one could say, there is some university policy that governs the location of the tents or prohibits putting them over the sidewalk. If that is the case, administrators and other parties responsible for making that policy should consider changing it or allowing for exemptions in the case of Veishea and Homecoming. If Iowa State is going to continue to take pride in Central Campus, common sense must rule over policy.