Friday, May 4, 2012
Weekly musings from Jeff Long, public relations manager with the Fox Valley Park District.
- LOCAL CONNECTIONS
- Jeff Long
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Friday, May 4, 2012
The Fox River has provided me a lifetime of recreation—four decades worth that started with boyhood fishing adventures and has evolved into bird-watching kayak trips today. That beautiful river, our shared community resource, has given me and countless others a stream of enjoyment that just keeps on flowing. Like the river itself, the Mid-American Canoe & Kayak Race has been a reliable old friend. Every year during my youth, on the first Sunday in June, my friends and I made a beeline on our bikes to downtown Batavia for a riverside view. That was decades ago, but the giddy excitement still stirs every year. On Sunday, June 3, the Mid-Am celebrates its 51st anniversary. It started in 1961, the brainchild of former Beacon-News outdoors …
Friday, November 4, 2011
Weekly musings from Jeff Long, public relations director with the Fox Valley Park District.
- LOCAL CONNECTIONS
- Jeff Long
-
Friday, November 4, 2011
On a postcard-perfect fall afternoon last week, a long-dreamed vision became reality on the Fox River. With a crystal blue sky as the backdrop, and fall colors setting the shorelines ablaze in bonfire hue, a bridge between yesterday and tomorrow was set in place. Like the namesake project itself, the Trail Gap, this bridge was put together piece by piece. The new bike/pedestrian bridge is a landmark extension to the Fox River Trail, bringing the project thisclose to filling the missing link that will make this an uninterrupted, 75-mile sanctuary for runners and cyclists from Oswego to the Wisconsin border. The new bridge spans the west channel of the Fox River, connecting with Hurds Island, where a paved trail will take trail users along …
Thursday, July 28, 2011
The Conservation Foundation's new project - a coffee-table book guide to the Fox - details environmental efforts, and points out places to explore.
A new publication about the Fox River is quickly making its way into backpacks and onto coffee tables across the region. The Citizen's Guide to Preserving the Fox River, a joint project of The Conservation Foundation and the Fox River Ecosystem Partnership, with grant funding from the Gaylord and Dorothy Donnelly Foundation, profiles the Fox River and the conservation initiatives the community can undertake to protect it, as well as outlining the recreational opportunities available along the river. About 25,000 of the free guides have been distributed to many area village halls, libraries and local businesses along the Fox River from Lake County to where the river meets the Illinois. The guides have been getting a positive response from …
Thursday, July 21, 2011
Event benefits the Oswegoland Park and Recreation Foundation.
Nature lovers of all abilities are invited to explore the Fox River Saturday while benefitting the Oswegoland Park and Recreation Foundation. Participants in Paddle for Parks can choose to canoe or kayak from the dam below Montgomery to Yorkville. A riverside lunch at Hudson Crossing Park breaks up the journey. Shuttles return participants to their cars. The event runs from 10 a.m. to 2 p.m. A $45 fee includes a kayak or canoe rental, lunch and shuttle. Proceeds benefit the Oswegoland Park and Recreation Foundation. “The focus of the foundation is the preservation of our natural areas. This event allows us to showcase one of Oswego’s greatest natural resources—the Fox River,” said Margaret Gienger, superintendent of marketing at Oswegoland…
Tuesday, May 31, 2011
A look at the history of the bridges built over the Fox River that brought the Montgomery community together.
We take our bridges for granted now, and it’s hard to realize there was a time when we didn’t have them. Building bridges is often used as a metaphor for developing relationships between people and cultures, but in Montgomery, the bridges solved our physical division as it brought the community closer together. After the first bridge was given to us, generations of children who lived on the east side of the river were able to cross the bridge to attend school. The east side families now had access to grocery stores, church, post office and whatever the village had to offer. In the earliest days of the village, the only means of crossing the Fox River was a ford at the end of Jefferson Street. On the eastern bank, the road picked up again…
Tuesday, May 17, 2011
Pat Torrance brings you the history of Montgomery through the eyes of its crown jewel, the Fox River.
It was the river that drew settlers to this part of Illinois in the early 1800s, and the river that sustained them. The town was sited here for two important reasons. The first was transportation. The stagecoach line forded the river here on its way to Chicago. And second, the Fox River provided the ideal site for a dam. Water power was needed and mills were being built in each little village along the waterway to harness its energy and turn the wheels of future industry. Not only was the riverbank ripe for development, it was bounded by a lush prairie where birds and animals made their homes among the vegetation. The beauty of the plains, alive with the songs of birds and the fragrant scent of wildflowers, welcomed those early families …
Friday, April 15, 2011
Here are some ways to help the environment locally, and see a real difference before your eyes.
So Earth Day is next Friday. Not sure why the earth gets a day. I mean, what’s it ever done for us? Apart from giving us a place to live, and water to drink, and grain to eat, and air to breathe, and making sure we don’t all go flinging off into space at any given moment. But apart from that, you know, what’s the big deal? Okay, okay, I’m joking. In fact, I’m not sure why we need a day to remind us that taking care of our planet is important. I need reminding myself pretty often—I recycle everything I can, but I don’t reuse shopping bags when I know I should, and I have no idea what my carbon footprint is. But I know it’s important. I think part of the issue I have is that “Earth Day” sounds so massive, as if the problems facing the planet…
Tuesday, February 22, 2011
National Weather Service warns of possible flooding, but homeowners along River Street say water levels are not bad.
UPDATE: The National Weather Service has shortened the flood advisory: it's now in effect through Wednesday night. Water levels were measured at 12.6 feet Tuesday morning, and are expected to keep falling, accoring to the NWS. The National Weather Service issued yet another flood advisory Sunday night for the Fox River in Montgomery. But according to homeowners along the riverbank Monday afternoon, water levels were nowhere near as bad as they’ve been in the past. With intermittent rain Sunday and Monday, and the potential for snow Monday night, water levels through Montgomery had risen past the “action stage” by Monday morning, according to the National Weather Service. That stage is 12.5 feet, and on Monday the levels were measured at 12…
Friday, February 18, 2011
Village officials say water levels, pumped up by melting snow from the Feb. 2 blizzard, are not expected to rise to dangerous levels.
The National Weather Service issued a flood advisory Friday for the Fox River in Montgomery. It will remain in effect until Sunday night. The warning also includes the Des Plaines River at Riverside in Cook County, the Fox River at Dayton in LaSalle County, and Sugar Creek at Milford in Iroquois County. According to the NWS’ hazardous weather outlook for the area, also issued on Friday, the warmer weather over the past few days has caused accumulated snow from the Feb. 2 blizzard to melt into waterways. And expected rain on Sunday night could compound the problem, according to the report. The Fox River through Montgomery is expected to rise to 12.6 feet tonight, according to the NWS. The “action stage” for that section of the Fox is 12.5 …
kpfarrer
10:27 am on Saturday, November 12, 2011
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