… that folks will probably still find a lot of construction, as crews try to beat the inclement weather that often follows summer. Don’t you love how a road morphs from being filled with potholes and pits to the “rough, grooved surfaces” to being skateboard smooth with the person-hole covers sticking up like moguls to being curbed and striped and ready again to try to withstand our vehicles and our weather?

… that the City has received $720,000 from the State of Illinois to fund the reconstruction of the lakefront bike path from

Lee Street

to

Clark Street

. This project is one of only 27 (out of 332) projects awarded through the Illinois funnel of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act. The money comes to the City’s Parks Division through the Illinois Transportation Enhancement Program (ITEP), which uses federal funds to promote transportation enhancements such as bike trails. Added to the previous half million dollars, this makes $1.27 million in ITEP funds for the path. Construction is scheduled for next spring.

… that folks who could not get onto Maple southbound from University and/or Emerson recently know that the widening of the sidewalks there between Clark and Church is underway. The City initially was going to transplant the trees that were there, says Paul D’Agostino, superintendent of the City’s Parks/Forestry division, but “by the time the contractor was ready to start, none of them was worth trying to save. Most were dead, and those that weren’t, were very unhealthy. The new streetscape includes all new rees once the walks have been widened.” He adds, “If you’ve ever been there on a Friday or Saturday night, you know the current walks cannot accommodate the masses of pedestrians.” From our readers:  Since this
is a “green” edition of the RT, TG thought these might be of interest:

TG: As you know, there are several school gardens in Evanston. Now we have a website devoted to them, cbplace.com/garden/. It has photo galleries there for the gardens at Dawes, Kingsley, Oakton and Washington schools and there is enthusiasm to get more going next spring. We are promoting the site as a way to get more folks involved. Volunteers are welcome as there is plenty of work to be done.

– Clif Brown, webmaster, Evanston School Gardens

From TG: And those gardens – at least the ones TG has seen – are wonderful, quite an addition to the schools and the community. Let’s hope you get some volunteers.

The Traffic Guy thinks …

… that the City is going to upgrade Fire Station #2 and replace some windows on Fire Station #1.

… that the City is also going to rehab the Brummel-Richmond tot-lot. (Richmond is one of those few-block streets in southwest Evanston.)

… that the new ramp to the library might have poetry stamped into the concrete.

… that the City will purch ase 300 trees for planting this fall.

… that Sprintcom. Inc. will put some dish satellites on our north (

Gross Point Road

) and south (

Hartrey Avenue

) water standpipes. TG loves that word.

… that a traffic signal is coming to Sheridan and Church.

… that the City is sending three roll-off boxes and a Dodge Durango (condition: “very poor”), a Chevy Blazer and a Ford Crown Victoria (“poor”) off to the December Lake County auction.

… that Evmark, the downtown marketing association, proposes to distribute fliers telling people where they can park. Some of these will be included in parking tickets. One assumes that, unless Evmark leaflets residential neighborhoods and nearby communities, most of the rest of them will be seen by folks who have already parked their cars – clearly a well-considered program.

… that Bike the Ridge (between Howard and Church) is supposed to be bigger and better than last year. Mayor T. will open the event at Howard and Ridge at 9 a.m. sharp on Oct. 4. One of the best things about last year’s ride was that a representative from the company that resurfaced that section of Ridge was out on his bike. Let’s hope he or another representative returns to see how their project made it through the winter. TG thinks this should be required of all street-repair contractors.