Interesting about Ranney Park. As the city does not even keep the grass cut, I certainly have little objection. Wonder if all the apartment dwellers who walk across the park to Frandor will find themselves inconvenienced though.
If the north Ranney park changes are done in a way that includes a diagonal path from the northeast corner to towards the midwest side of the park then I don't expect any complaints. It's a natural "cow path" and shouldn't get in the way of the redesign of the park as long as the materials used are compatible with the wetlands changes.
Thanks hood! Wow, so it looks like there is no walkway/observation path coming from the northeast corner of the park. That's a shame, because all of the landscaping and design will be walked over when people recreate the shortcut. It should really be made "official".
I don't know, I hope not. I also hope that the changes don't remove the possibility of sledding at the hill, depending on what barriers are placed around the wetlands.
I mean, I'll wait to see what the plans are, because it's not clear about entrances, but even if they move it from the northeast corner to the northwest corner, were' talking about a few meters given how little frontage is on Grand River. That's not a big deal, at all, unless you're talking about some other entrance I'm not familiar with.
Though the plan above doesn't include them, I'm kinda assuming that there will be entrances from all sides. I can't imagine why they'd only have access from the west. The sledding hill is still present in the plans and it looks like some sides of it should be clear for sledding.
I pulled these three paragraphs from page 6 of the drain report, they sum up what they'll be doing pretty well (there may be errors as it's copied from a scan):
Bioengineered rain gardens will also be constructed within the Frandor area parking lots, portions to the north within the main shopping center
and south in the Sears parking lot. These bioengineered rain gardens have the same cross section of amended soil and materials as the
Michigan Ave. rain gardens to achieve storage and treatment through plant uptake and through the soil profile . The main portion of the Frandor
parking lot will be rebuilt and storm water will be managed by installing these rain gardens within the parking lot in order to handle first flush
volumes for storm water treatment before being discharged to secondary storm water treatment systems including the storm water quality
treatment pond south of Michigan Avenue and/or the Ranney Park Storm Water Treatment Ponds.
The Ranney Park Storm Water Treatment Ponds are a series of constructed wetlands, bioretention areas, cascading rock swales and waterfalls
and deeper storm water treatment ponds. This system is designed as regional detention for developed areas upstream that currently do not have
onsite detention and will be used for overflow storage during larger rain events for excess storm water discharged from other regional detention
or LID systems The storm water system on Ranney Park will be a mix of gravity fed inputs and a recirculation system so that storm water may
be continuously treated through these areas at all times (not only after rain events) before discharging to the storm water quality treatment pond
south of Michigan Avenue.
The Storm Water Quality Treatment Pond located south Michigan Ave. and the proposed Red Cedar Renaissance Development will consist of a
large pond with fringe wetlands and open water including some deeper holes. This pond is designed as regional detention for developed areas
upstream that currently do not have onsite detention and will be used for storing excess runoff during larger rain events . Additionally this pond will
provide water quality benefits by wetland filtration, nutrient uptake, extended detention, sedimentation and serve as a reservoir for recirculating
storm water through LID treatment systems.
It sounds really interesting, and I am impressed that they so concerned with the drainage and river issues. It will be so great to have this right in the middle of our city. Also great, they are rebuilding a better parking area for Frandor. It would be good if they choose permeable pavement to replace the black top. That with the rain gardens could stop almost all rainwater from going into drain. As I have said here before permeable pavement works really well in northern areas. It is so cool to see a street that has it next to a street that does not. One has water on the road and water gushing down the gutters, the other is just wet no water in the gutters and drys out very quickly. Because there is sand and rock below the pavement the water drains into the ground, it does not stay on or below the pavement so there are no pot holes or frost heaves to break the pavement.
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I pulled these three paragraphs from page 6 of the drain report, they sum up what they'll be doing pretty well (there may be errors as it's copied from a scan):