Oh, no need to apologize. I just happened to remember reading it at the time. Agree that it is good news! I think I read it was an issue where the boilers at the Simon Plant were modern enough where they could be retrofitted for natural gas, whereas Eckert's cannot.
REOtown is not devoid of college students or young people. There are many students living in my building today. There are new shops and restaurants and more coming. Even the housing nearby is being rehabilitated. The gas plant is quiet and not so bad to look at. It just lets steam. I grew up before they built the tall stacks and the air was bad that is for sure. I am sure that even ten years ago the situation was very different in REOtown.
Did you see that Lansing was voted the most livable affordable city in America by Liviablity.com? In the past, the citizens of Lansing were rather proud of owning our own power plants, even if they did not appreciate the danger of the emissions. The last MSU student I talked to said she wished she could find a place to live in REOtown. Times have changed. All the better with the coal plant gone.
I live in an area not too far from Eckert. There a lot of good things to be said about it. I don't think the coal plant is one of the good things. That said I'll agree that the situation is rapidly improving. LBWL's gas plant seems to be about as good of a gas plant as you'll get.
However a recently published study found that housing values were 3-7% lower within a mile of a power plant. Other studies show that income levels and educational attainment lower the closer you get to a power plant. As nice as the gas plant is, I don't ever see the day when people are excited to live next door to one. They might put up with it, but I doubt they consider it an amenity. Unless I'm reading the results wrong, the gas plant is still pumping out particulate matter, which is not healthy.
Honestly I bought in the area almost on a whim. However, after staring at those three smokestacks enough times, I started to wonder how good it is to live next to power plants. Reading the scientific material has led me to believe that placing power plants in an urban area should be considered a last resort. I'm not going to up and move as a result but I would never advocate for such decisions.
The train has left the station on renewables; fossil fuels are on borrowed time. In addition to the many US power companies that have committed to substantially expanding their portfolio of wind and solar power, there are is a steadily growing number of car companies and countries that are committed to high numbers of electric vehicles in the near future.
I wrote the BWL this week concerning why the river has been so low through downtown in the last year or so. Apparently, the gates at the North Lansing Dam are not operating normally and the utility is investigating why that is. They didn't give many details, but apparently the gates must be too low and they can't get them up for the river level to be lower between the two dams.
It's weird, because they just renovated part of the dam not that many years ago (2011). Maybe the repairs actually damaged the base and water coming in through the bottom. I'll try and find out what they suspect.
I wish they would use this as an opportunity to clean up the river banks. The river looks a bit more natural at these levels, but now I understand why the level has been so low.
Got some more information back on this. Yes, the gates are raised and lowered depending on weather, time of year, etc...Well, they haven't been able to raise the gates back up to keep the water level like they usually do through downtown.
The Westside Reinforcement project has been going up quickly. The new giant line poles now line Old Lansing Road and you can see them from Frances Park across the river and above the tree line. While I understand what and why the BWL is doing this it is sad to see the industrialization of the skyline over there.
In REOtown the Great Wall is growing every day. It looks like there should be something really great being built there, too bad it's just a substation. The clear-cut area of the river bank looks very industrial now, there are two shiny aboveground steam pipes with their cement support columns, a new eight-foot tall cyclone fence, cement walls and the left behind tree trunks from the huge trees that they cut down. I am sure there is a good reason for all this but it looks really bad right now.
Interesting little piece of PR, I see, but the BWL announced today that they'd partnered with the city to donate 50 trees to the Eastside Neighborhood Organization. I believe this is for Earth Day.
Funny that they are donating what they are cutting down all over the city. lol Still glad to see trees being replaced. I'd be interested to know where ENA plans to plant these.
Also, looks like today was the last day for the public to submit their public art proposals for the walls of the Central Substation.
The brickwork is going up on the wall on the Malcolm X side. It looks good. It is interesting to drive down Capitol Ave [besides the lack of pavement] to see the wall at the end of the street. It brings REOtown much closer in the view from downtown.
Comments
Oh, no need to apologize. I just happened to remember reading it at the time. Agree that it is good news! I think I read it was an issue where the boilers at the Simon Plant were modern enough where they could be retrofitted for natural gas, whereas Eckert's cannot.
REOtown is not devoid of college students or young people. There are many students living in my building today. There are new shops and restaurants and more coming. Even the housing nearby is being rehabilitated. The gas plant is quiet and not so bad to look at. It just lets steam. I grew up before they built the tall stacks and the air was bad that is for sure. I am sure that even ten years ago the situation was very different in REOtown.
Did you see that Lansing was voted the most livable affordable city in America by Liviablity.com? In the past, the citizens of Lansing were rather proud of owning our own power plants, even if they did not appreciate the danger of the emissions. The last MSU student I talked to said she wished she could find a place to live in REOtown. Times have changed. All the better with the coal plant gone.
I live in an area not too far from Eckert. There a lot of good things to be said about it. I don't think the coal plant is one of the good things. That said I'll agree that the situation is rapidly improving. LBWL's gas plant seems to be about as good of a gas plant as you'll get.
However a recently published study found that housing values were 3-7% lower within a mile of a power plant. Other studies show that income levels and educational attainment lower the closer you get to a power plant. As nice as the gas plant is, I don't ever see the day when people are excited to live next door to one. They might put up with it, but I doubt they consider it an amenity. Unless I'm reading the results wrong, the gas plant is still pumping out particulate matter, which is not healthy.
Honestly I bought in the area almost on a whim. However, after staring at those three smokestacks enough times, I started to wonder how good it is to live next to power plants. Reading the scientific material has led me to believe that placing power plants in an urban area should be considered a last resort. I'm not going to up and move as a result but I would never advocate for such decisions.
The train has left the station on renewables; fossil fuels are on borrowed time. In addition to the many US power companies that have committed to substantially expanding their portfolio of wind and solar power, there are is a steadily growing number of car companies and countries that are committed to high numbers of electric vehicles in the near future.
I wrote the BWL this week concerning why the river has been so low through downtown in the last year or so. Apparently, the gates at the North Lansing Dam are not operating normally and the utility is investigating why that is. They didn't give many details, but apparently the gates must be too low and they can't get them up for the river level to be lower between the two dams.
It's weird, because they just renovated part of the dam not that many years ago (2011). Maybe the repairs actually damaged the base and water coming in through the bottom. I'll try and find out what they suspect.
I wish they would use this as an opportunity to clean up the river banks. The river looks a bit more natural at these levels, but now I understand why the level has been so low.
Got some more information back on this. Yes, the gates are raised and lowered depending on weather, time of year, etc...Well, they haven't been able to raise the gates back up to keep the water level like they usually do through downtown.
The Westside Reinforcement project has been going up quickly. The new giant line poles now line Old Lansing Road and you can see them from Frances Park across the river and above the tree line. While I understand what and why the BWL is doing this it is sad to see the industrialization of the skyline over there.
In REOtown the Great Wall is growing every day. It looks like there should be something really great being built there, too bad it's just a substation. The clear-cut area of the river bank looks very industrial now, there are two shiny aboveground steam pipes with their cement support columns, a new eight-foot tall cyclone fence, cement walls and the left behind tree trunks from the huge trees that they cut down. I am sure there is a good reason for all this but it looks really bad right now.
Interesting little piece of PR, I see, but the BWL announced today that they'd partnered with the city to donate 50 trees to the Eastside Neighborhood Organization. I believe this is for Earth Day.
Funny that they are donating what they are cutting down all over the city. lol Still glad to see trees being replaced. I'd be interested to know where ENA plans to plant these.
Also, looks like today was the last day for the public to submit their public art proposals for the walls of the Central Substation.
The brickwork is going up on the wall on the Malcolm X side. It looks good. It is interesting to drive down Capitol Ave [besides the lack of pavement] to see the wall at the end of the street. It brings REOtown much closer in the view from downtown.