Lehigh Parkway 1: Erosion, Erosion, Erosion

The Lehigh Parkway was always my favorite park.  My first go around with these Park Logs in 2009 was highlighted by my various adventures and escapades in this massive urban park.  As I began to research and educate myself about the ecology and environmental science going on in these places, it was in the Lehigh Parkway that I became so disheartened by the conditions of our park system. 

Three years later and not much has changed in the Parkway.  What has changed has changed for the worse.  Before I get to Part One, I want to say that of all the parks here in Allentown the Parkway has the most pure potential for an amazing ecological restoration that would be a legitimate destination. I’ll speak about that after I get through the whole park over the next few days.  For now though, once again, let’s dive back into the Lehigh Parkway…

(Part One begins at the pedestrian converted bridge and continues on the right side of The Little Lehigh, through Bogart’s Bridge and back to the parking lot. )

After crossing the bridge, and meandering down the gravel hill, this walk begins next to one of the most ecologically interesting places in the entire Allentown parks system.  There is a spring here that runs with regularity from around this time of the year until the dry spells of summer come round in August.  Today, I will spare you my sermon on the spring but I will tell you that I am working on some major projects for the site and I really hope to share news with you soon!  Below are the pictures of the spring site taken yesterday.

The story of this Park Log is erosion.  I can literally think of nothing that left an impression on me more than the erosion I saw on my walk through this part of the Parkway.  That and the unbelievably ridiculous four foot wide grass swatches alongside the creek, like the ones over at Cedar Creek Parkway.  I am going to keep this short and let the pictures speak for themselves but before I end this post, there was a particular occurrence that happened down there yesterday that I want to tell you about.

So, I am strolling up to Bogart’s Bridge wondering what the hell this is about:

And, I hear it.  Being that it is February, despite the 60 degree afternoon temperature the park was a rather quiet place yesterday.  That’s why when The Great Blue Heron yelled across the treetops, I froze where I was standing. It seemed so foreign and out of place and that is something I hope doesn’t become a trend in the years to come although I fear that it will.

Look through the pictures. Look at the damage.  You cannot think this is okay.  Also, it smells like sewage throughout the park… more on that tomorrow.

To wrap this up:

Cedar Creek Parkway 2: Well, they never paved The Rose Gardens.

At the height of the controversy in 2009 over “improvements” that were planned at Cedar Creek (Beach) Parkway, a frequent complaint in my comment feeds (usually after an insult or a challenge to a fight), was that the City planned on razing The Rose Gardens with bulldozers and paving over everything.  Well, almost three years later, it hasn’t happened.  Yes, they put in the stone path, cut out some trees and changed the aesthetic of the place but it is by no means destroyed.  As a matter of fact, the new trellises are nice and so are the new benches.

The rest of the area surrounding The Rose Gardens and especially the regions nearest to the creek, those conditions –well, No Surprises there. The issues I brought to light three years ago remain and little if any improvement has been made.  This is, as I mentioned yesterday, due to a public demand for the way folks here in Allentown think a park should be.  The ecologic consequences of our park management strategy here in the City are not now and have never been a concern of the individuals who so desperately seek to keep the Parks the golf course analogs they have been since their inception.

What I mean is, Why is there an area of mowed grass separating the tiny grow zone from the walking/running/biking path? You can see clearly that this is a very wet area and as such has absolutely no valid reason to be shorn on a regular basis.  You can see divots from machinery and patches of grass so frequently inundated that they are permanent mud patches! This isn’t some radical reforestation I am talking about here folks.  Let Nature have it. The cost of the maintenance coupled with the ecologic destruction are not worth this area being mowed! ( Let me state clearly – this situation is on us, not the City.  The City is maintaining the Parks the way Allentonians demand for them to be managed)

Behind the silly grass strip, are the infamous mirror ponds.  Yep, there they are. With how many resources the City has to pour into these things to keep algal blooms minimized, it really makes me wonder why they are still there.  O yeah, a lot of people would go Bill O’Reilly berserk  if they were removed.  Given the massive suburban expansion over the last fifty years and the major increase in polluted runoff ending up in these ponds, they are simply no longer tenable. It’s my guess that they will always be there though, with problems just getting worse in years to come. 

O and here is another grassy strip that should not exist:

With frustration and disappointment building to a fever pitch… LOOK A DUCK!

Yeah, Cedar Creek Parkway is mostly an ecologic mess.  Let me be clear, this is not some radical environmental mission to turn the urban park into some magical forest that may or may not contain fairies and sprites.  The call for riparian restoration is to protect a source of drinking water for the City of Allentown and to dramatically lower maintenance costs in the future. Wildlife habitat creation and a more natural appearance are bonuses.

You have got to admit though, when you leave a park that is 100% contained in a floodplain of a creek that floods after 30 minutes of drizzle, and you see neighboring gardens with better vegetation, that there is a problem in the park.

Down where the creek banks have been left to grow, there is less stream bank erosion and gabion projects from previous attempts at bank stabilization have actually worked.  There is even a sign that the Allentown EAC has placed down there to explain the purpose of the Grow Zone.  Yeah, there are a lot of invasive species in there but this Grow Zone remains a rare bright spot in an otherwise ecologically dark park.

This isn’t 2009.  I am not going to preach anymore about the subject of Cedar Creek Parkway on Remember.  The situation is what it is and until the populace comes around, learns about what is going on, and demands the needed changes; nothing is going to change. I am working on some education events regarding these matters in the coming months and I will be sure to share them on here. 

For now and likely for the future, there are no surprises at Cedar Creek Parkway.  I’ll be popping down to Muhlenberg Lake in a bit but for now and for the purposes of my Park Logs 2012, I am finished with Cedar Creek Parkway. 

Otherwise, I’ll go nuts and well, LOOK! THE SKY!

No surprises.

(You can read Part 1 by clicking on any of this: Cedar Creek Parkway – Part One: The LCA destroyed everything)

Cedar Creek Parkway–Part One: The LCA destroyed everything.

Popping over to the Lehigh County Authority’s website, a masterpiece of modern art can be seen.  A beautiful painting of water connections and drinking supply spread is laid out in a pretty font on a bright blue page and if you look hard enough, a fuzzy pink bunny or two.  The reality of the project that is painted so delicately and prettily on that site is far different.

It would see Cedar Creek (Beach) Parkway can’t catch a break.  Over the last few years there have been project after project requiring ecologic disturbance and upheaval to create new park amenities, for better or mostly, for worse.  This latest disturbance completely takes the cake for park destruction though.  Crews from the LCA came through the park, removed trees and grass and dug a massive hole to lay a water line in from one end of the park to the other. 

Then, they rolled through there with heavy machinery like marshmallow peep stuffed kids making a beeline for presents on Christmas morning.  The result of this project now that it is finished is a legacy of damage for the park.  Soil compaction, long an issue at this park – especially because there exists little to no proper riparian buffer for the majority of creek bank here, has been intensified and has rendered the south side of the creek a highway for non-point source pollution (stormwater).  

Mercifully, as you can see in the pictures below, the Ferngully-esque villainy of the LCA spared my research site at the west end of the park by just a couple feet.  They did kill one of my signs though.

The dug up soil has been filled in, primarily with junk fill.  You can see the silver remnants of rock and specks of gravel peeking through the widespread hay throughout the entire run of destruction.  The tracks of the machines they used to cause this damage have left so many ruts throughout the park, it looks like a Monster Truck rally had occurred.  The ruts even destroyed parts of the macadam path that was created the last time the Park was torn apart by construction.

Walking past the new destruction, the old problems plaguing this park appear as prevalent as ever.  The ridiculously wet conditions of 2011 have further exposed the glaring need for proper riparian restoration in the park as the creekbanks have been eroded more substantially and channeled worse than ever.  Streams are meant to wind folks, in order to create the riffles, runs and pools needed to sustain the proper variety of habitat for invertebrate and vertebrate life.  Channeled streams are bad news and, they also lead to more erosion.

This exponential function of natural destruction will only be worsened by the LCA project that has just finished up.  Looking at this section of Cedar Creek Parkway, there was very little to be happy about ecologically or aesthetically.  The long needed riparian restoration, that through root development would actually hold the creek bank in place while creating wildlife habitat for native organisms, is still absent here and the park is beginning to seriously suffer for it.

Previous restoration attempts that cannot work without riparian vegetation show where the creek bank used to be just a decade or so ago:

Riparian restoration is a visually stunning and beautiful thing when done correctly.  Yes, it would appear different than the parks have here in Allentown. Yes, it would be a change of pace for some park visitors.  Now, though, the need for it is more apparent than ever.  This creek – part of our drinking water source – is in a bad way and it is getting worse.  The needed restoration has not been implemented because of a continued public outcry whenever the grass is left to grow more than a few inches high.  If change is to come at Cedar Beach, if we are to see the park survive, we need to ask for that change to occur.

I am hoping that my venture to the other side of the creek for Part 2 of my new Cedar Beach park log yields more favorable observations but you and I both know what it is that I am going to find.   After three years, my first park log has been entirely about witnessed destruction.  Let’s hope they aren’t all focused like this one has been.  Fingers crossed. 

Cleaning Up The Lehigh Parkway

(Lots of Pics on the bottom but check out The Morning Call’s picture gallery and coverage of the event! – click here)

The second best reason for the existence of parks in urban areas has got to be for the purpose of building communities.  People fill the parks around them at various times during the year and when they do so, they see other people.  That may sound like a strange sort of thing to say but the world we live in today can be rather divisive and oftentimes leaves people as strangers when at one time they could consider each other neighbors.

Yesterday, in the Lehigh Parkway, a group of individuals joined together and formed one of those park spawn communities in order to help clean up damage from old storms.  I was able to organize the event so that students from Muhlenberg College’s EnACT (Environmental Action Student Group), councilpersons from the Allentown Environmental Advisory Council, members of the Lehigh Valley Road Runners, park walkers, park lovers, concerned citizens and active stewards all met between saw blades and made a difference.

A fallen tree was the major focus of this day of action and within an hour of beginning our work, the tree was entirely tended to.  Our group was able to accomplish quite a lot, pretty rapidly, in the course of that hour.  It was fantastic.

With strangers working together for a common purpose for no pay or recognition, a difference was made.  The purpose of this day was simple and not incredibly remarkable.  The thing that made the event remarkable were the people who worked together to complete the task at hand.  As you view the pictures below I sincerely hope you can see what I am talking about and I really hope that it encourages you to come for the next one.  What beats making friends from strangers?

Number 18 was pretty awesome Readers.  Thank you

Destruction in the Lehigh Parkway

Today, the day before the big clean-up down in the Parkway, I want to share with you some pictures of what it is exactly that we will be doing down there.  The backstory is that last October, the rare heavy snowfall wreaked havoc on the trees in our area. I am sure those who were without electricity for extended periods of time remember the period well.

The thing is, the Parks department here in Allentown is very overworked and understaffed and as such, has not been able to attend to every site of destruction that resulted from that storm.  This is where we come in.  From small branches to an entire tree – we are going to help clean up this area of the Lehigh Parkway.

So, look through the pictures and see the destruction for yourself.  Everyone will be able to help! Not all of us are Paul Bunyan! Don’t worry – there is plenty of litter down there to tend to as well!

Tomorrow – Saturday – at noon! Meet at the second bridge off of MLK Boulevard! On the city map of the Parkway it is called Lehigh Parkway North Bridge and you can see that map by clicking any of these words!!

Google Maps:  
View Larger Map

Over at Lehigh Valley Running Scene, they have posted the following picture of the exact meet-up location!

Here is the destruction we will be tending to:

Please come out to the Parkway, This Saturday at Noon – YOU CAN HELP!

The snow in October dealt serious damage to our park system. The Parks department is understaffed and overworked and without the funds needed to hire more staff.

Now, it is our turn to help.

On January 28th, at noon, at Schreibers Bridge – we will meet to cut, carry and remove fallen trees (big trees) and help the Park get put back together.

Please come out and help!! And, PLEASE SHARE AND SPREAD!!!

Schreibers Bridge is the second bridge after turning off Martin Luther King Boulevard!!

Andrew Kleiner and his Journeys

The journeys beyond the parks were first rooted in a desire to explore the history of Allentown Pennsylvania.  Over time they became missions of purpose – to see further and experience things that I never thought I could because of a lifetime of mental illness.  Those journey posts exposed a sort of confessional blogging style that I developed over the last three years and really culminated in My Muhlenberg College Journey. 

The picture above is the very top of one of Allentown’s greatest landmarks, The Neuweiler Brewery.  I have grown up here over the last 28 years and the looming, decaying structure has always been a sort of identifying figure for the city both in its physicality and in its dilapidated structure.  I had the chance to take a tour of the mythological thing way way back in the infancy of this blog. The post is linked below.

Visiting the Ghosts: Neuweiler Beer – “Nix Besser”

Just a little further past the City of Allentown, one of my first ventures into the “wilds” of the Lehigh Valley was at the Whitehall Parkway.  I love this place.  There are the ruins of rail cars and some of the first major industrial factories all throughout the park.  When summer reaches its green lushest, go and wander here.  You will here nearby highways but I promise you will feel and probably end up lost.

The Whitehall Parkway (July 2009)

Look at that view – from one mountainous edge of the Lehigh Valley all the way across to the other.  As far as majesty is concerned, Bake Oven Knob is the place to find it.  Beautifully, it is a short ride from here (about 40 minutes) and, as you will see in the posts below – there is no season not worth visiting the Knob.  The sunsets in Winter on the Knob – click the link below, I can’t do them justice.

 1. Bake Oven Knob (August 2009)
2. Michelle and Sabrina go to Bake Oven Knob, and up there you see the world. (March 2011)

Sitting in a classroom, reading a book, or viewing a blog written about a watershed can have a lot of people scratching their heads.  Watersheds are pretty intense things to consider and they are one of the most important concepts in modern Ecologic stewardship.  In the summer of 2009, I journey to the headwaters of both Trout Creek and Cedar Creek (major players in the Lehigh River watershed) and took viewers on the journey with me with many photographs and narration.  Take the journey again:

1. The journey of Cedar Creek
2. The journey of Trout Creek

Why would you not want to sit where the rivers meet? This post is about a favorite place of mine in Downtown Easton and I ended it with the text of one of my favorite poems by one of my favorite poets, Gary Snyder.  I mean – bridges, rivers, waterfalls, and poetry? You know you want to check it out

At the Forks of the Delaware (For All)

A Nature center near the middle of a city wherein one the largest and most productive industrial plants in the history of America.  That’s awesome and so is this place.  When I initially posted these non-Allentown places, I was lucky to have 10 viewers visit the site.  This post probably had my lowest to date.  It’s pretty much unread folks!! Check it out

Monocacy Nature Center

Like the Center above, Lock Ridge Park sits where once a major (and groundbreaking) industrial part of our region’s past once flourished.  It is hard to write about these places when I know the posts have so many pictures that help tell the story.  I will mention that in Part 2, I fell in a creek in the middle of winter and almost managed to kill myself.

1. Lock Ridge Park –Part One
2. Lock Ridge Park – Part Two

Yes folks, now – now things have gotten epic.  I consider the following two posts – Must Read posts when I consider the last 590 pieces I have done for this blog.  I am not going to write much but, I went to the ocean (that’s Barnegat Bay above), saw an incredibly unique ecosystem and married my scientific investigation to my confessional blog posting.  The second post is one of my very few video posts and it might be the most personal thing I have ever done on Remember.

1. Island Beach State Park NJ, Part One
2. Island Beach State Park NJ, Part Two – Video Blog

That’s Lake Nockamixon and this post is about my Dad.  I owe him a serious amount of my inspiration for this park business.  You should check out my journey post, to my Dad.

At Lake Nockamixon

From a lake at the bottom of Center Valley to the height of Mt. Tammany at the Delaware Water Gap…. These posts were a tad experimental and I do not know even now if they were a success.  Lots of pictures, lots of sweating – another awesome journey
1. Missed Turn Black Snake Boulder Omens
2. Red Dot Trail Panting Sweat Soaked Boulder Climb
3. Downward Blue Dot Hot Forest Boulder Hop
4, Into the Stream – Relief

From the Gap to the Lehigh Gorge… Like Bake Oven Knob, the Glen Onoko run is one of the favorite destinations for outdoor enthusiants and environmentally minded folks in Eastern PA.  This post has some really suprising and neat stuff in it – I won’t spoil anything.

1. Glen Onoko Run: Part one- Introduction
2. Glen Onoko Run 2: Nature’s Crowds
3. Glen Onoko Run 3: Reclamation

I am not going to say anything about the next links – You should check them out.  This was my journey to Nashville TN in the Fall of 2010.  Check it Out, there is nothing else like in on Remember!

1. Oh Shenandoah: A Beginning…
2. Music City USA  (Author’s Note: This one might be the only blog post I teared up writing)
3. Last Day in Real America: Outreach to the Affected
4. When Panic Passes: Taking a Walk
5. Nashville Parthenon: Centennial Park  

And, the final journey thus far – so amazingly fitting… I hope you made it this far. If you did – go post “I made it” on my Facebook wall or on the Facebook page for Remember! J

Thanks for reading.

One last link…

Being Saved in the Lehigh Gap

Saying NO to Pottersville: Real community in the Lehigh Valley

(See also: Tune In, Get Pissed, Turn Off and Help Out!)

I spent the majority of the weekend having occasionally heated discussions with friends about the political state of America right now.  It would seem that there are a lot of people out there who are pretty upset and ultimately disillusioned about the state of the country.  I began writing occasional pieces about all of this when I brought Remember back to life a few weeks ago and today, I am going to offer some suggestions.

Go to one of the following websites, read them and check out a place they suggest or – better yet – make one of the recipes on them, invite friends and neighbors over for dinner and try some new food together.

The first one I am linking to is called Save the Kales and this blog is a literal explosion of local community, culture and love.  Jaime is a dear friend of mine and I have followed her endeavors, achievements and successes for a few years now.  A couple of summers ago Jaime and I held a picnic down at Cedar Beach which remains one of the high points of my term as writer of Remember.  (The link to that picnic is here, so many pictures, so much awesomeness, I would love to talk her in to doing something again!) (The pictures in this post are from that event!)

Link to Jaime’s Blog: Save the Kales by Jaime K

This second blog is by a very nice person who I had the chance to meet at a recent blogger’s convention over at the Artsquest center in Bethlehem.  The title here seems to say it all for me as Colleen states that she is From Here Now.  See, if you grew up around here you are familiar with the constant bleating refrain of “There is nothing to do…”, Colleen takes that uninformed opinion and turns it right on its head.  (Note: I hope that years of park adventures in Allentown and points beyond here on Remember also show how wrong that is.)  I recommend checking Colleen out and then trying to do what she does because just like Jaime, she is doing it right.

Link to Colleen’s Blog: From Here Now

Perhaps the most blatant and helpful guide to finding out what to do in the Valley that is unique and part of a burgeoning cultural scene is Laini’s Little Pocket Guide.  If you have yet to hear of it – go and check it out right now. I’m serious.

Link to Laini’s Little Pocket Guide

You know, maybe it is because folks would rather just go to the Applebees because it is easy because it is routine and because it challenges no aesthetic sense of being.  I don’t know.  I do know that right outside your front door here in the Valley, down in Philly, up in New York or wherever you may be reading from, there exists a world where you can be a part of something real; where you can be part of a community.

This is how you stop Pottersville.  This is how you affect real change in America.  Remember, every single cent you spend is a direct vote for the way in which you want your world to be.  Your money dictates the zeitgeist of the country.  You are a perpetual voter.  Don’t forget it.  If you don’t think Washington is ever going to come around, you can make them come around in time by remembering that you are voting at all times.  Don’t forget it.  The corporations, conglomerations and banks need our money to survive as do the local establishments and local bastions of culture and community those ladies above are talking about.  It is your choice readers.

Lastly, I have one more site for you to check out. Go visit lehighvalleylive sometime and investigate what they are checking out as far as our “Scene” is concerned.  I have found a great many restaurants, shows and events on there that I would not have heard about otherwise.  Also, show wise – you need to be checking out The Secret Art Space.

Link to Lehigh Valley Live

If you want to see three years’ worth of outreach events, educational journeys and other assorted community activities you can click on the tab above that says: Events, Outreach, Education or click any of these words – it will take you there!!

Towel Drive for Turning Point Lehigh Valley

So, as I suggested a few weeks ago – Let’s Get Active!! (Click on any of this to get to the original post!) Here is a great chance to do just that!!

Link to Facebook Event Page

Donation Location! :

Fegley’s Burrito Works

818 W Hamilton St., Allentown, PA 18101
(Donations will begin at Noon, January 18th)

Turning Point is looking for bath towels and I figured we could start a drive to get some! They are looking for as much as 400 so let’s do this!!

WE WILL DONATE 400 TOWELS!!!

Here is some information on Turning Point:
“Turning Point of Lehigh Valley is a safe place where victims of abuse and their children can find refuge We provide services in Lehigh and Northampton Counties to more than 5,000 victims of domestic violence each year. Our mission is to work toward the elimination of domestic violence; increase community awareness of the problem; and empower victims of domestic violence by providing shelter and support services.”

Turning Point Website

SO: Leave a comment if you can donate a towel!! We need 400 comments!!

Please help out! Share and Spread!!!

Let’s do this!!

I am going to keep at it for two weeks!

Andrew Kleiner and the Allentown Parks

I was at a blogging conference last night and another Lehigh Valley blogger very curtly said to me in response to discovering that I was the author of Remember: “Remember? More like I forgot.”  That was not the nicest thing I have heard in three years of writing this thing but it is far from the worst and, it really got me thinking.  As I am preparing to return to the Parks for new and fresh series of examinations, I feel like it is appropriate to take a walk (ha) down memory lane today.

The posts I am about to link to are a complete literal documentation of how a laid off employee with no proper science background began to learn about the world around himself and over time found himself becoming a scientist.  These are unedited.  All the mistakes I made scientific and otherwise are here laid bare because they help tell the story.  These posts are a chronicle of why a park system is so important in an urban corridor.  These posts show what something as simple as a Park can do – a Park can change someone’s entire life.
(There is more post after the links – click and read Please! But keep on heading down!)

1. West Park (April 30^th 2009)
2. Trexler Park (May 2^nd 2009)
3. South Mountain (May 9^th 2009)
4. Lehigh Parkway (Spring –Fall 2009)
5. Keck Park (May 23^rd 2009)
6.  The Fish Hatchery ( May 27^th 2009)
7. East Side Reservoir (May 29^th 2009)  
8. Muhlenberg Lake (June 1^st 2009)
9. The Rose Gardens (June 2^nd 2009)
10. Cedar Beach Parkway (June 3^rd 2009)
11. Union Terrace (June 5^th 2009)
12. Trout Creek Parkway [Part One – June 8^th 2009]
       Trout Creek Parkway [Part Two – June 9^th 2009]
13. Canal Park (June 14^th 2009)
14. Jordan Park (June 19^th 2009)

Before continuing with the links, as I go back through the history of my blog, I want to mention that the change really began here.  As construction at Cedar Beach Parkway reached a head, I revisited the early parks and began writing about riparian buffers and invasive species. It took just under two months for these Parks to change me and my writing and content shows just that.  I mean, that Muhlenberg Lake post is completely scientifically uniformed and truthfully – in error; but that is what makes this journey beautiful!  It makes that which comes in 2010, 2011 and now in 2012 that much more important!!
More Park Logs:
15.  Fountain Park [Part One – July 21^st 2009]
        Fountain Park [Part Two – July 22^nd 2009]
16. Percy B. Ruhe Park (July 24^th 2009)
17. Bucky Boyle Park (July 29^th 2009)
18. Jordan Meadows (July 30^th 2009)

Then, I was set.  But, that is the story of how all this began! It is how The Muhlenberg College Journey happened – how I ended up on top of mountains (like the picture that started this post!) and knee deep in the cold winter waters of the Atlantic Ocean.  It is where I am going back to now and where I hope you come with me!