Saturday, October 15, 2005

Dual Purpose Ponds

Having ‘fun’ with the latest plans to widen I-25.

Speaking of ideas to improve the city.

Let’s look at one of the known changes to the proposed widening of I-25 through the center of town. Specifically let’s look at these storm-water collection ponds that will be scattered along the length of the highway.

Obviously, if you know ANYTHING about weather in this town, you know that we get the occasional deluge. These ponds are intended to help prevent flooding. However, as my former battalion commander would put it, “For a few dollars more, you can go first class.”

What I propose is that a selected number of these collection-ponds be configured for duel purpose use; they not only be collection ponds, but also recreational facilities.

One idea would be that such ponds be laid in concrete and the concrete be configured as a skateboard park. It would not take that much space. Nor that much concrete. And, when the ponds are not being used for their primary purpose, they could be used for recreational purposes by some of the agile young men who like that kind of entertainment.

Others, given space, could be made into local parks with a set of childrens’ playground equipment that would not be damaged by the occasional flooding.

Everyone knows that the occasional deluge and resulting flooding would last only a few hours. The rest of the time, unless these facilities are established for dual-purposes, they’ll be so much wasted space.

I think we can think farther ahead than we are currently doing…..

Thursday, October 13, 2005

An Evening At the Open House

Our friends at CH2MHill host a small party.

Attended the New Pueblo Freeway Open House last night. It was hosted by our friends at CH2MHill at the behest of CDOT.

The topic of the overall program was Pueblo’s heritage vis-a-vis that part of which was under potential threat of being demolished or at least degraded as part of the proposed plan to widen Interstate 25 as it passes through the center of the city.

There was a cute series of presentations by 8th-graders from Beulah School on the history of Colorado, stemming from the initial exploration by Coronado, in his vain effort to find the fabled Seven Cities of Cibola, through the founding of CF&I from three competing steel/metal smelting operations. Each of the kids was dressed in attire apropos for their part of the presentation. Personally, I found part of it informative, as I’m a service brat and learned all about Louisiana history, being there at that age. However, I get the impression that the natives were getting a re-bluing—as we’d say in the Army—of stuff they’d known all their lives.

I am curious why they had to go to a charter school in Beulah to get these children. But that’s another question, better asked of Christian Piatt and Kitty Kennedy, who are running for D-60 school board.

Back on topic….

I had hoped that our friends from CH2MHill would have spent a bit of time at the lectern bringing us up to speed on changes to their plans and the current state of affairs with respect to the timeline on the Environmental Impact Statement (EIS) and Inter-Governmental Agreement (IGA), both of which are essential to the overall project. But we didn’t hear anything specific.

In order to learn about those activities we had to go to the boards and beat the bushes.

The boards did have information about the timeline for the EIS, but nothing specific that I could see about who was doing what with it right now. There was no one at that particular board to ‘beat about the bush’ with in order to find out.

Looking that the boards on the planned widening of the interstate, it was not readily apparent what had changed since our friends from CH2MHill had last shown us what was planned. I had to ‘beat about the bush’ with the guy there for details. He did point out that some rainwater collection ponds had been added to the plans. This in an effort to prevent localized flooding in the event of another deluge we have every Summer. [Note: With respect to these intermittent ponds, I would like to make a suggestion on how to use them for two purposes. I see a potential recreational use for them when they are not being used for their original purpose. More on that later.]

The gentleman working that board could not identify much else in the way of changes. I would like CH2MHill to highlight any changes they’ve made to their plan as we saw it last year, just so we can catch up to them. We all studied their plans last year. But we’ve slept since then. They’ve slept WITH their plans. We’d like to get up to their level of familiarity.

There was a board about the plans for Mineral Palace Park. However, I did not see anyone I could talk to about any changes to the plans to mitigate the impacts I-25 has had in the past and will have in the future on that district park. Looking over the plans, I did not see anything that jumped out at me as a significant change to what we had seen described before.

There was no board nor any person to beat about the bush with over the status of the IGA. However, I did catch wind that the IGA was being discussed. I think it would be VERY nice if our friends at CH2MHIll would bring us up to speed on the IGA process. Where it is. Who is doing what. And allow some of us to kibitz on the meetings.

It was nice of CH2MHill to invite us to their open house. The children were, as all children dressed-up, rehearsed and trotted before serious adults are, charming. Some good information was provided. A lot of necessary information was not.

In all honesty, I still think this whole project is going to be significantly impacted by the proposed Super-Slab to the east of town. The Slab is coming. It’s much more needed than this project, in my personal opinion. But that’s another essay.

Friday, May 13, 2005

Storm Warning

How to deal with REALLY ‘hard’ (rain) water.

Anybody remember the flood of ‘21? Probably not very many. And few of them care to use a computer. So, as we approach the century anniversary of the biggest flood anyone, living or dead, can remember in Pueblo, the fine people who get paid to ponder those sorts of things—hundred year floods—have been dutifully working at updating their information and plans for coping with a really hard rain. Possibly mixed with a very serious snow-melt.

Last Wednesday, they held an open house on what they’ve been doing todate. Someone told me about it, so I decided to stop by and see what was going on.

The study being conducted is to be accomplished in several parts; southwest Pueblo, focusing on Lake Minnequa and points to the south and west, Fountain Creek and another part, which escapes me at the moment. The southwest Pueblo/Lake Minnequa area is being worked at the moment. I do not know when they will be getting to the Fountain Creek part of the study. However, I am mighty interested in seeing that part, living where I do.

What I saw of the plans for Lake Minnequa was very nice. And the use of most of the lake for a nature area with paths and trails looked great. The plans for turning the southern end of the lake into a recreational complex were VERY nice. Looking at them I was reminded of several meetings of the Pueblo Neighborhood Partnership where Clark Davis was preaching the need to improve recreational opportunities for ourselves and our youngsters. This looked like a dream-come true for such efforts in the BAND area of operation. I would like to think that Clark et al would be all over this like bees on honey.

As with all projects, money is a key issue. And, according to reports, THERE IS NO MONEY for the recreational enhancements. Well….maybe that could change, if some of us were to guide the City Fathers and re-orient some other activities to focus on that area. Not to mention the possibility of using lottery monies, if we should be elegible for such, to help finance the plan.

We certainly don’t need to do it all at once, but we could start doing it.