It's a fair guess that thousands more people have explored the Southlands Estate in Warwick in the last two weeks than the property has seen in the last two, if not ten, years thanks to the walks organised on successive Sundays by the Bermuda Environmental and Sustainability Taskforce (BEST) and the Bermuda National Trust.

And those visitors should at the very least have come away with a good understanding of why environmental organisations have been trying to save this magnificent property.

And a great many may well have come away with a determination to help in the fight. Why? Because there are very few properties like it in Bermuda. The combination of extensive woodlands, the strange and unique quarries, gardens, tunnels and other features make for a property unlike almost any other.

More importantly, as has been noted here before, there are very few open areas of this kind left in Warwick or Southampton, and the National Trust Palm Sunday walk demonstrated that very well.

The far sighted decision to preserve and protect the land from Horseshoe Bay as far as Warwick Long Bay and Astwood Park (once itself slated for development) are a critical natural resource for Bermuda. The addition of the South Shore stretch that makes up Southlands would add to that, but the property on the northern side of South Shore Road is a critical green lung in a densely populated part of Bermuda.

In that context, the reports that Government has now gotten as far as naming the property for Pauulu Kamarakafego (Roosevelt Brown) are welcome. It suggests that the land swap with Morgan's Point will go ahead, and that the development proposed by the Southlands owners has been accepted.

This is a fair trade that helps move the remediation and redevelopment of Morgan's Point forward at the same time that it saves Southlands.

Both proposals have merit, Southlands for the reasons above, and Morgan's Point because it is one of the few brownfield sites available that can help the tourism industry to recover.

Indeed, it is a vastly better site than many of the properties being proposed for development, with the caveat that the cost of environmental remediation will be very high. But in terms of location, the Morgan's Point peninsula is hard to beat.

To be sure, it would be wonderful if it too could be a park, but the reality is that it is well suited for tourism development, and in today's circumstances, it represents a genuine opportunity for Bermuda.