Wednesday, May 14, 2008
Tuesday, May 13, 2008
Build Hill Place right or don't build it
The maps based on aerial photos below are reasonably new, and people who live in some houses along the Town Branch of the West Fork of the White River between Eleventh Street and Fifteenth Street who are paying on mortgages on their homes now have to pay for flood insurance.
A close look at the maps reveals that FEMA now acknowledges not only that many buildings in that stretch are either IN or immediately adjacent to the acknowledged flood plain but also that much of the infrastructure for the failed Aspen Ridge site was built in the flood plain between Sixth and Eleventh streets west of South Hill Avenue.
People who have lived in the neighborhood a long time know that the actual floodplain is much wider in places than the FEMA map shows.
While the developers of the Hill Place project are being required to remove a sewer line and blocks much of the flow under the bridge at Eleventh Street, they have not been told to build their proposed traffic bridge higher than the current walkiing bridge. In fact, they are proposing to build the traffic bridge LOWER than the walking bridge built in 2005 or 2006 across the stream. Because federal agencies will barely even look at the plans, the city must make the decision on this further construction in the floodplain.
In 2003 and 2004, the developers claimed that FEMA maps did not show floodplain in the area. Neighbors pointed out that the Town Branch FLOWED OVER much of that land frequently even though the government had not designated it as floodplain and that, not only did the stream flow over the bridge at Eleventh Street but sometimes flowed over the bridge at Fifteenth Street.
Just another example of NIMBIES being ignored in favor of developers and builders who don't care what harm their projects might do as long as they are able to reach the density level required to make a huge profit. People who say "Not in my backyard" in this neighborhood have seen the water there (and some have seen it in their houses or flowing in front of their houses); so they aren't talking about a trivial problem.
The lowest portion of the former wooded wetland at the southeast end of the project must be dug out and structured to pre-Aspen Ridge grade or lower to reapproach the historical flood-prevention capacity of that land.
No further paving should be done southeast of the existing walking bridge and the impervious fill dirt should be removed and water again should be allowed to soak into appropriate organic soil.
Developers claim their right to build as long as their project doesn't send more water off their land than flowed off there before.
They use voodoo mathematics that ignore overflow from the Town Branch and that ignore the nearly 100 percent permeability of the surface of the area before it was cleared and filled with rocky dirt and red clay.
They rely on the fact that water has threatened the downstream homes a little more each year during the decades the University of Arkansas has filled similar land on the campus and covered or dredged absorbent soil on the campus in favor of non-absorbent, non-organic soil and concrete.
Now is the time to begin to require developments to DECREASE downstream flooding, not aggravate it and blame the university for its building practices. Multiple wrong decisions don't add up to a right decision.
A close look at the maps reveals that FEMA now acknowledges not only that many buildings in that stretch are either IN or immediately adjacent to the acknowledged flood plain but also that much of the infrastructure for the failed Aspen Ridge site was built in the flood plain between Sixth and Eleventh streets west of South Hill Avenue.
People who have lived in the neighborhood a long time know that the actual floodplain is much wider in places than the FEMA map shows.
While the developers of the Hill Place project are being required to remove a sewer line and blocks much of the flow under the bridge at Eleventh Street, they have not been told to build their proposed traffic bridge higher than the current walkiing bridge. In fact, they are proposing to build the traffic bridge LOWER than the walking bridge built in 2005 or 2006 across the stream. Because federal agencies will barely even look at the plans, the city must make the decision on this further construction in the floodplain.
In 2003 and 2004, the developers claimed that FEMA maps did not show floodplain in the area. Neighbors pointed out that the Town Branch FLOWED OVER much of that land frequently even though the government had not designated it as floodplain and that, not only did the stream flow over the bridge at Eleventh Street but sometimes flowed over the bridge at Fifteenth Street.
Just another example of NIMBIES being ignored in favor of developers and builders who don't care what harm their projects might do as long as they are able to reach the density level required to make a huge profit. People who say "Not in my backyard" in this neighborhood have seen the water there (and some have seen it in their houses or flowing in front of their houses); so they aren't talking about a trivial problem.
The lowest portion of the former wooded wetland at the southeast end of the project must be dug out and structured to pre-Aspen Ridge grade or lower to reapproach the historical flood-prevention capacity of that land.
No further paving should be done southeast of the existing walking bridge and the impervious fill dirt should be removed and water again should be allowed to soak into appropriate organic soil.
Developers claim their right to build as long as their project doesn't send more water off their land than flowed off there before.
They use voodoo mathematics that ignore overflow from the Town Branch and that ignore the nearly 100 percent permeability of the surface of the area before it was cleared and filled with rocky dirt and red clay.
They rely on the fact that water has threatened the downstream homes a little more each year during the decades the University of Arkansas has filled similar land on the campus and covered or dredged absorbent soil on the campus in favor of non-absorbent, non-organic soil and concrete.
Now is the time to begin to require developments to DECREASE downstream flooding, not aggravate it and blame the university for its building practices. Multiple wrong decisions don't add up to a right decision.
Monday, May 12, 2008
FEMA floodplain map of Aspen Ridge/Hill Place and streets downstream
Please click on image to ENLARGE.
Please click on image to ENLARGE.
Please click on image to ENLARGE.
Monday, May 5, 2008
Fayetteville City Council to visit Town Branch Neighborhood development sites at 4 p.m. today. Everyone welcome. Need tax on topsoil removal
The mayor and members of the Fayetteville City Council are to gather at the failed Aspen Ridge town-house construction site near W. Sixth Street and S. Hill Avenue at 4:30 p.m. today (Monday, May 5, 2008 ) to view the 30-acre parcel from which nearly all the trees and topsoil have been removed. The rich, fertile, stormwater-absorbing, water-purifying soil has been either dredged out and hauled away or buried under tons of less-absorbent rocky soil.
Tuesday at 6 p.m., the council is to evaluate a plan that has been brought forward by Hank Broyles, who sold his share of the Aspen Ridge property to his partner in that venture, Hal Forsyth, soon after it was approved in 2005, but who bought the whole parcel after Forsyth's development ended with hundreds of low-income residents displaced but nothing built on the property.
Slimy, yellow silt-laden muddy water has overflowed from the failed Aspen Ridge site onto the north end of World Peace Wetland Prairie ever since that 30 acres' vegetation was removed and the soil replaced with non-absorbent soil. The Hill Place student apartment plan and the Summit Place plan must manage silt and stormwater properly or both WPWP and the Town Branch will be further damaged.
Broyles' new plan is to sell the property to
Place Properties, limited partnership, which develops and manages apartment complexes for college students in several states. The sale, apparently, is contingent on Broyles' getting the student-apartment plan approved by the council.
Please see
Summit Place, Hill Place maps and photos with first plans for Summit Place that were submitted to the Fayetteville planning department early this year.
Please see
Hill Place/Aspen Ridge plans, maps and photos with concept drawing from January 2008.
Town Branch neighbors are asking that the Summit Place plan be evaluated by the council before the council approves the Hill Place plan. Water from the eastern slope of Summit Place on Rochier Hill will increase erosion and further exacerbate the stormwater problems created by the Aspen Ridge land clearing and now the problem of the Hill Place project. Appian Design Center
Hill Place/Summit Place plan designers is planning both projects. Hank Broyles and John Nock reportedly own the Summit Place property.
The Summit Place project west of the Arkansas and Missouri Railroad is in Ward Four, while the Hill Place project is in Ward One.
As in the case of many adjacent projects, these are separate but the upstream work will have a bearing on the downstream project's success in protecting people further downstream on the Town Branch of the West Fork of the White River from flooding as well as an effect on the quality of water entering Beaver Lake, the water supply for most of Northwest Arkansas.
For details, please call 479-444-6072.
Tuesday at 6 p.m., the council is to evaluate a plan that has been brought forward by Hank Broyles, who sold his share of the Aspen Ridge property to his partner in that venture, Hal Forsyth, soon after it was approved in 2005, but who bought the whole parcel after Forsyth's development ended with hundreds of low-income residents displaced but nothing built on the property.
Slimy, yellow silt-laden muddy water has overflowed from the failed Aspen Ridge site onto the north end of World Peace Wetland Prairie ever since that 30 acres' vegetation was removed and the soil replaced with non-absorbent soil. The Hill Place student apartment plan and the Summit Place plan must manage silt and stormwater properly or both WPWP and the Town Branch will be further damaged.
Broyles' new plan is to sell the property to
Place Properties, limited partnership, which develops and manages apartment complexes for college students in several states. The sale, apparently, is contingent on Broyles' getting the student-apartment plan approved by the council.
Please see
Summit Place, Hill Place maps and photos with first plans for Summit Place that were submitted to the Fayetteville planning department early this year.
Please see
Hill Place/Aspen Ridge plans, maps and photos with concept drawing from January 2008.
Town Branch neighbors are asking that the Summit Place plan be evaluated by the council before the council approves the Hill Place plan. Water from the eastern slope of Summit Place on Rochier Hill will increase erosion and further exacerbate the stormwater problems created by the Aspen Ridge land clearing and now the problem of the Hill Place project. Appian Design Center
Hill Place/Summit Place plan designers is planning both projects. Hank Broyles and John Nock reportedly own the Summit Place property.
The Summit Place project west of the Arkansas and Missouri Railroad is in Ward Four, while the Hill Place project is in Ward One.
As in the case of many adjacent projects, these are separate but the upstream work will have a bearing on the downstream project's success in protecting people further downstream on the Town Branch of the West Fork of the White River from flooding as well as an effect on the quality of water entering Beaver Lake, the water supply for most of Northwest Arkansas.
For details, please call 479-444-6072.
Saturday, May 3, 2008
Friday, April 25, 2008
Earth Fest in Rose Garden during 2008 Springfest in Fayetteville, Arkansas
PLEASE CLICK ON IMAGE TO ENLARGE poster
Monday, April 21, 2008
Photo set from Sunday's Earth Day Celebration at World Peace Wetland Prairie will grow until complete
Please see first 33 photos in set of
Earth Day 2008 photos from World Peace Wetland Prairie and return later to see more!
Earth Day 2008 photos from World Peace Wetland Prairie and return later to see more!
Saturday, April 19, 2008
Saturday, April 12, 2008
Please volunteer April 19 to help give away oak trees in Fayetteville and Rogers
From Dina Nash of the Arkansas Sierra Club:
The Arkansas Forestry Commission asked if the Sierra Club would like to do a tree give-away project: They have 50,000 extra 3-foot-tall oak trees (Willow oaks, Water oaks, Shumard oaks, and Pin oaks) and they'd like to give them away. I said yes, and we very much need your members to volunteer some hours to help take these little trees out of the paper bundle of 100 trees, put 1 or 2 in a bag, tape the top of the bag with masking tape, and give them to people who will promise to water them once or twice a week for several months so they will get a good start. So if you have 3 or more hours to help give away trees to help global warming, please email or call me ASAP, so I can plan who'll be there to take care of the give-away table: Location: Wal-Mart on Mall Drive at Joyce Street, a block west of College. Near the Garden Center 10 AM-4 PM (3 hour shifts, 10-1 and 1-4, or the whole 6 hours) Three people per shift, some bagging, some taping, and some handing out trees and putting the planting info sheet with them An easy way to green up some bare places you may know of, too. Take some home to your yard, church, school, or farm! Give some to neighbors who lost a tree in a storm, etc. There are also openings at the Rogers Wal-Mart on Walnut Street on the l9th!!
Thanks so much for making this a success: please call me at 530-8328 My cell phone is in the 479 area code so Fayetteville friends don't need to make a long-distance call to reach me in Little Rock. Or you can email me at Dina_Nash@yahoo.com .
Thanks, Dina Nash, Vice Pres. Central AR Sierra Club 479-530-8328 Little Rock
If you can't reach Dina, you may call Aubrey Shepherd at 479-444-6072 for information. You need not be a Sierra Club member to participate.
The Arkansas Forestry Commission asked if the Sierra Club would like to do a tree give-away project: They have 50,000 extra 3-foot-tall oak trees (Willow oaks, Water oaks, Shumard oaks, and Pin oaks) and they'd like to give them away. I said yes, and we very much need your members to volunteer some hours to help take these little trees out of the paper bundle of 100 trees, put 1 or 2 in a bag, tape the top of the bag with masking tape, and give them to people who will promise to water them once or twice a week for several months so they will get a good start. So if you have 3 or more hours to help give away trees to help global warming, please email or call me ASAP, so I can plan who'll be there to take care of the give-away table: Location: Wal-Mart on Mall Drive at Joyce Street, a block west of College. Near the Garden Center 10 AM-4 PM (3 hour shifts, 10-1 and 1-4, or the whole 6 hours) Three people per shift, some bagging, some taping, and some handing out trees and putting the planting info sheet with them An easy way to green up some bare places you may know of, too. Take some home to your yard, church, school, or farm! Give some to neighbors who lost a tree in a storm, etc. There are also openings at the Rogers Wal-Mart on Walnut Street on the l9th!!
Thanks so much for making this a success: please call me at 530-8328 My cell phone is in the 479 area code so Fayetteville friends don't need to make a long-distance call to reach me in Little Rock. Or you can email me at Dina_Nash@yahoo.com .
Thanks, Dina Nash, Vice Pres. Central AR Sierra Club 479-530-8328 Little Rock
If you can't reach Dina, you may call Aubrey Shepherd at 479-444-6072 for information. You need not be a Sierra Club member to participate.
Saturday, April 5, 2008
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