Friends of the Riverfront

In a case with remarkable parallels to the situation on Nicollet Island, courts in Illinois have halted construction of a private school's athletic facility on Chicago public parkland

Latin School of Chicago is halfway done building a $2 million soccer field primarily for its own use in adjacent Lincoln Park. The school struck a backroom deal with the Chicago Park District in December 2006. The public process that followed was deficient to nonexistent. On the strength of that, the school began construction in November 2007 and was set to complete the project on May 26, 2008. But the project, seen as a private school's land grab of public property, stirred outrage.

On April 16, a nonprofit grassroots citizens group called Protect Our Parks filed suit against the city, the park district and the school. The project soon unraveled. First, on April 25, a Cook County Circuit Court judge granted an injunction stopping the school from installing lighting, scoreboard, goalposts, benches, or signs. Then on May 2, a state appellate court halted construction altogether. Now the school is making offers to try to settle with the citizens group before a May 20 hearing which could mark the end of its project.

Learn more at savelincolnpark.org.

Development projects that threaten to destroy archaeological resources have put the St. Anthony Falls Historic District in Minneapolis on the list of the state’s Ten Most Endangered Historic Places for 2008, the Preservation Alliance of Minnesota announced May 1, 2008.

The next day the Minneapolis City Council voted to proceed with the destruction of recently-discovered archaeological remains on Nicollet Island, a major feature of the national historic district with its intact neighborhood of 19th-century houses. A private developer, DeLaSalle High School, intends to remove the last remains of the island’s mansion district – some on public property – to build a football field. DeLaSalle’s plan for mitigating this destruction doesn’t consider alternatives that would preserve archaeological resources, such as building the field at grade or re-using excavated historic materials.

Other sites under threat within the St. Anthony Falls Historic Districts include mill ruins where a residential development called “The Wave” is proposed, and historic tunnels that served city’s 19th-century flour milling district and even the falls themselves, which might not survive construction of the proposed Crown Hydro project intact.

The federal Consumer Products Safety Commission has launched an investigation of artificial turf athletic fields after state officials in New Jersey found high levels of lead in fields there, which the state ordered closed. Read the April 17, 2008 USA Today article here and watch the ABC-TV news report from the same day here:

UPDATE: The U.S. Environmental Protection Agency now says it will carry out its own investigation of hazards in artificial turf.

Friends of the Riverfront has appealed city approval of the archaeology mitigation plan for the site of the proposed DeLaSalle High School football stadium. The Minneapolis City Council Zoning and Planning Committee will hear the appeal Thursday, April 24.

The Minneapolis City Council today voted down a private developer’s plan to install artificial turf on an athletic field proposed for Mississippi riverfront parkland. The 13-0 vote was a formality after a surprise announcement that the developer, DeLaSalle High School, had withdrawn its appeal.

The unanimous decision to reject artificial turf came a day after contentious debate on the issue at a Committee of the Whole meeting showed the city council to be deeply divided. At that meeting, several council members said they were concerned about the impacts of synthetic turf’s crumb rubber base on the environment and children’s health.

Also on Thursday, Friends of the Riverfront released a Braun Intertec review of research on synthetic turf fields, which concluded that “tire crumb infill can be a potential health hazard to the users and other individuals in the immediate vicinity of the field, as well as … a risk to the neighboring environment." (Click below to download the Braun Intertec report.)

The Minneapolis action comes amidst growing national outcry against artificial turf fields. As the New York Times reported today, the New York City Public Advocate yesterday joined the Natural Resources Defense Council and other groups in calling for a moratorium on artificial turf, pending a city Department of Health investigation. (Click below to download their letter.) Bills pending in the California, New York and Connecticut legislatures would ban artificial turf fields and require environmental studies. A website, SynTurf.org, tracks the backlash.

The Minneapolis City Council is set to vote Friday, Feb. 29, 2008 on whether to reverse a condition it placed on previous approvals of the DeLaSalle stadium on Nicollet Island: that the field be natural grass.

The decision was set into motion DeLaSalle appealed the Minneapolis Heritage Preservation Commission's decision that synthetic turf is an inappropriate material for the St. Anthony Falls Historic District.

City Council Member Cam Gordon City Council Member Cam Gordon (Green Party - Ward 2) gave a detailed explanation of his objections to putting synthetic turf on Nicollet Island at his blog. Some excerpts:

"I strongly oppose this idea. Putting plastic grass in the middle of the Mississippi in this historic National park is just a bad idea. AstroTurf is significantly worse than real grass on a number of fronts - it does not sequester carbon, does not aid water infiltration, does not cool the air, and in fact contributes to the heat island effect. The state-of-the-art type that is being proposed also includes its own artificial dirt --- 200 tons of ground up old (and toxic) tires. These are known to contain toxins and have yet to be proven safe for children to play on or for a river eco-system."