Friends of Rockefeller Park and Cleveland Cultural Gardens
 

DOAN CREEK "RESTORATION" -- AUGUST 2011 UPDATE The project has been renamed and shrunken. The Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District is now the project manager of what was originally was called the "Doan Creek Restoration Project." The purpose was to tear out the creek's channeling walls from University Circle to East 105th Street, and from Mt. Sinai Drive to St. Clair Avenue, and create a "wild" creek with sloping banks covered with undergrowth. But the necessary funding was insufficient. So when the Sewer District took over, renaming it the "Doan Brook Stream Enhancement Project," they first scaled back the project, retaining the section from University Circle to East 105th Street, and shrinking the northern segment from Mt. Sinai Drive on the south to before Superior Avenue on the north. But funding was still insufficient, so they scaled it back again, removing from the project the section from University Circle to East 105th Street, and keeping only the short section from Mt. Sinai Drive around the backside of Rockefeller Park Lagoon to Martin Luther King Drive.

Their project plan shows channeling walls replaced with sloping banks in some spots and stepped banks in others. However heavy rains in the heights bring overflow from the old combined sewers in those neighborhoods. Water laden with raw sewage would flood the "wild" banks. When the waters recede, they could leave sewage-laden undergrowth and even solid waste behind that the neither creek nor rain could wash away. Children playing near the creek could step into what amounts to a sewer.

A 2003 report opposing the original "Restoration" plan

Plans to "restore" Doan Brook, in Rockefeller Park, to a natural state have alarmed the Cleveland Cultural Gardens Federation, who are concerned about the possible effects on the various ethnic gardens in the park along Martin Luther King Drive north of University Circle.

As part of a mediation agreement with the FAA, in exchange for being allowed to destroy some wetlands in the course of expanding the Cleveland Hopkins Airport's runways, the city has agreed to remove portions of the historic stone retaining walls currently channeling Doan Creek.

Preservationists argue that the channelization of Doan Creek, done early in the twentieth century as part of the creation of Rockefeller Park, was beautifully done and is now a critical part of the park's historic fabric. To remove the walls and allow the stream to wander, they claim, would destroy that historic ambiance, undermine other portions of the park and damage some of the Cultural Gardens.

The Doan Brook Restoration project has also alarmed and sent into action many veterans and their organizations in an effort to stop this project. The veterans are objecting to not having been included in the process, and because this project will adversely affect the WWI memorial. This memorial consists of over 800 trees planted along MLK Boulevard, each having a memorial medallion, one tree for each of the WWI soldiers from this area who lost their lives in that war.

Everyone should be concerned about reversion to wild, un-managed undergrowth that will make the area look abandoned, creating a attraction for the criminal element and a safety problem for visitors and residents.

Contact Information:

Tel. (216) 514-7001
infocitizensvision.org
www.citizensvision.org
Friends of Rockefeller Park and Cleveland Cultural Gardens
P.O. Box 32700
Cleveland, Ohio 44132-0700

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Regulators damage a park: no need for this "wetlands restoration" By Andrew P. Morriss

Doan Brook Stream Enhancement Project

Doan Brook Partnership