It's Like A Postcard

Last week when I prevailed on some players at City Hall to meet me in Lehigh Parkway, somebody remarked that it's like a postcard. With the creek banks now overgrown, it would difficult to recreate the nationally distributed postcards of Allentown parks from the 1950's. But the old postcards still exist, giving testimony to the beauty that was ours. There will be a formal discussion with the City Council Park and Recreation Committee next Wednesday at 5:00p.m. They will hear about stream velocity theory and habitat from the grant driven new age science crew. I will talk about beauty. I still believe that the parks were created for the pleasure of people.

reprinted from August of 2013

Bill White Should Stick To Christmas Lights

Bill White can't win with me. I either accuse him of wasting his bully pulpit on fluff like christmas lights and cake contests, or being wrong on more serious topics. Today, he's wrong on Wehr's Dam. Bill's biggest mistake is taking the Wildlands Conservancy and their bought and paid for report as gospel. For his latest column he interviewed the Wildlands Director, but didn't seek comment from one of the dam advocates. He and the director, who had told the South Whitehall commissioners that she would respect their decision and move on, keep referencing the $million dollar estimate to repair the dam. The director, Abigail Pattishall, even says that the estimate is probably on the low side. Anybody who has ever visited the dam knows that it isn't going anywhere. It's a massive concrete wedge, most of which cannot be seen, sitting on a massive concrete shelf. Two years ago, the DEP concluded that overall the dam is in good condition. Wildlands Conservancy and their contracted report by KCI, based the ridiculously overpriced repair estimate on removing all the silt in the mill pond, rerouting the creek, and rebuilding the dam completely from the shelf on up. In reality, for what the report cost, $239,000.00, the dam could have been kept in good repair for the next fifty years. Bill, stick with the cake contests.

Voodoo Science and The Wildlands Conservancy

Hanover Township and the Monocacy Creek are about to lose some beauty and history to the Wildlands Conservancy, as that grant greedy deceiver rips out another dam. Like the former Robin Hood Dam in Lehigh Parkway, these short decorative dams, less than one foot tall, are no barrier to fish migration. Almost after every rain the dams disappear as the water level rises, giving the fish easy passage. In the drier periods, the low dams help oxygenate the water. The Wildlands Conservancy comes to the municipality with a power point presentation showing how detrimental dams are to waterways. Specifics, such as that the dam is only 8 inches high, are omitted. They point out how Pennsylvania leads the nation in dam removals. We of course would be better off if the DEP concerned itself with the chemicals used by the fracking industry, and other real issues affecting our health. Local college professors are recruited to testify about about the benefits of dam removal, again generalities and site unspecific. It's a sad course of events to lose the beauty and memories enjoyed by so many people for so long in our parks. My associate Bernie O'Hare reports on this latest scheme by the Wildlands Conservancy. He evens seems to buy into their false premise. That's the problem with sacred cows, too few people are willing to see their flaws.

Robin Hood Bridge, Before and After Wildlands Conservancy's Crassness

                                       photo by Tami Quigley


Last spring I conducted a well attended tour of the WPA structures in Lehigh Parkway for  Friends Of The Allentown Parks. We ended the tour at the last WPA structure built in Allentown, the Robin Hood Bridge. This fall I unsuccessfully tried to save the dam, which was built with the bridge as part of the beautiful setting. The Wildlands Conservancy had a grant to remove the dam, from which they also harvest administrative fees. In a crass act of destruction they removed the dam, and piled the broken dam rubble around the beautiful stone piers, destroying a classic view which Allentown had enjoyed for over 70 years. A naturalist told me the other day that the project even disappointed from his environmental point of view. The stream is no deeper, the silt didn't reduce, and a large portion of the former stream-bed is exposed. Although I recognize and support Friends Of The Parks as a most worthwhile organization, I must respectfully decline their invitation to conduct another tour this coming spring. It is apparent that this Mayor, City Council and even the new park director have no appreciation of the irreplaceable gifts that were bestowed upon our park system so many years ago.  

UPDATE: The post above is reprinted from December of 2013, when it was titled, I must Respectfully Decline. I did relent, and conducted a second tour of the park last summer. The new park director referred to above was only here long enough to approve two dam destructions by the Wildlands Conservancy. The second dam removal, the Trout Hatchery Dam, may well have caused the massive fish kill last year. We now have a third new park director within two years, and another chance for responsible park stewardship, which has been long lacking.

An Open Letter To Lindsay Taylor, Allentown Park Director, Part 1

Ms. Taylor, congratulations on your confirmation as Director of Allentown Parks. You should take great pride in your new position, for decades Allentown was considered one of the premier park systems in the country. We were blessed that Harry Trexler had one of the leading landscape architects in the United States formulate plans in 1928, before the depression. When Roosevelt created the WPA, Allentown was shovel ready with those plans. Thousands of men worked in Lehigh Parkway, Fountain Park and Union Terrace between 1935-1937. What they accomplished would have normally cost untold $millions of dollars, and taken 50 years to finish.

Unfortunately, the proper emphasis has not been applied in recent years to the iconic park system. I'm sure like your two predecessors, you have already been approached by the Wildlands Conservancy. Pictured above is the former Robin Hood Dam. Your immediate predecessor agreed to its demolition by the Wildlands Conservancy, even before he ever saw the little dam. Although you will now never be able to experience its beauty and sound, you may see its broken pieces, they are piled around the stone piers of the companion Robin Hood Bridge. That broken rubble ruins the former beauty of the piers, which rose straight up out of the water. To those of us with any respect for beauty and history, it was adding insult to injury. Although the dam was only 12 inches high, and no real barrier to fish, the Wildlands Conservancy got its way. As a local historian and advocate for the WPA structures, it saddens me to inform you that despite the prominence of the structures in our parks, not one dollar has been spent on the stone maintenance in years. Major park policy has pretty much been relinquished to the Wildlands Conservancy's agenda, removing historical dams and blocking the view and access to the streams with riparian buffers. The former Fish Hatchery Dam was built directly by Trexler. The Robin Hood Bridge and Dam were the last WPA projects in Allentown. I have the sketch plans of those structures, they were the pride of the city when completed in 1941.

It is my hope that you decide to revive the great tradition of Allentown parks, instead of just settling for a Certificate Of Cooperation from the Wildlands Conservancy.

photocredit: molovinsky

Saving Wehr's Dam

In today's Morning Call article, the reporter states that he was gobsmacked that the dam was saved. Perhaps if he wasn't the fifth reporter to be assigned to the story in the last nine months, he would have been less surprised. Perhaps if he had attended more meetings he would have credited more people in the effort, notably myself, Bob Schantz and Leroy Schmidt. While that's water over the proverbial dam, there are consequential issues which still need to be addressed. While the dam certainly received a temporary stay from execution, I doubt that the Wildlands Conservancy will stand down. The reporter kept mentioning the KCI report, as if its conclusions were gospel. In reality, it was generalized current dam removal patter, not even applicable to the Jordan Creek and Wehr's Dam. The projected cost to repair the dam was based on conservation methods usually reserved for the Washington Monument and the Statue of Liberty. In the real world, the DEP said two years ago that the dam is in overall good condition. The report by the Wildlands Conservancy, done by KCI, and paid for by a Pennsylvania grant, cost $239,000.00. As a taxpayer, I'm concerned with the channel between the Wildlands Conservancy and Harrisburg, which allowed a quarter of a $million dollars to be spent on virtual propaganda. I'm also concerned with the channel between the Wildlands Conservancy and South Whitehall Commissioner Christina Morgan, which encouraged one of the most significant features of Covered Bridge Park to be threatened. If the Wildlands Conservancy has its way, that picnic table shown in the picture above would replaced with a riparian buffer, which is actually a wall of weeds. It's necessary to realize that our parks were intended for recreation, not the Wildlands Conservancy grant harvesting agenda. The dam must receive some protective status, so that the citizens need not again defend such an iconic place of beauty.
photograph by K Mary Hess