By Annette Eisman
Lake View Hill Neighborhood Association

Thanks to the efforts of Sara Petzold, the Lake View Hill Neighborhood Association (LVHNA) has been rejuvenated and continues to press forward with Northside concerns regarding the city’s curb/gutter/sidewalk plan. Alder Rebecca Kemble sponsored a Sept. 7, 2017, information exchange meeting, where city staff outlined their Complete Streets plan. Northsiders gave very definitive responses to that plan and requested the city consider following the new Environmental Protection Agency guidelines that stress better ways for neighborhoods to handle stormwater runoff.

Following that meeting, the LVHNA Curb/Gutter/Sidewalk Committee met with Alder Dave Ahrens from the Buckeye neighborhood to discuss the process he used to help some residents in his district avoid curb/gutter/sidewalk construction. The committee then met with Alder Kemble, who had met with Rob Phillips of the City Engineering Department. Mr. Phillips noted that many of our streets already have swales and other natural features that help control runoff.

The goal of this committee is to prevent an unhealthy change to our neighborhood. Standard implementation of Complete Streets would eliminate hundreds of mature trees and replace them with impermeable concrete that puts unfiltered water into the lakes, jeopardizes the water table and reduces our valuable urban canopy. Instead, the focus should be on Green Streets, a model neighborhood using the best environmental methods to handle stormwater runoff.

Contact lvhna1@gmail.com with questions or to get involved.