Posted Aug 20, 2009, 1:25 AM
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Join Date: Nov 2007
Posts: 672
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Another point of reference for people: this is across Saginaw St. from Windmill Place. My preference would have been to build on one of the many surface lots in the south end of downtown if a renovation of an existing building was out of the question. It would have been great to get some new construction off of Saginaw St. to start filling in the rest of downtown. In fact, it would have been FANTASTIC to have the Social Security Administration and IRS share a building in downtown, instead of two really boring buildings out on the fringes.
Anyways, another article about a rather small thing, but it's cool none-the-less.
Quote:
Flint resident helps bring downtown's Grand Fountain back to life
Posted by Kristin Longley | The Flint Journal August 13, 2009 12:05PM
FLINT, Michigan -- It had been 17 years since the waters of downtown Flint cascaded over the Grand Fountain's elaborate network of concrete cliffs and steps.
Then Dave Johnson came along.
The innovative Flint resident cobbled some parts together so that on Wednesday -- for the first time since 1992 -- the repaired pump hauled river water into the picturesque fountain.
It took Johnson, who's a consultant for the Downtown Development Authority, and his team three years of reverse engineering, scouring the Internet for parts and plain ol' trial-and-error to get the waters flowing again, he said.
Now, the fountain that once was a potential target for demolition is drawing spectators as people flock downtown for Back to the Bricks.
"Whenever I could scrape up some parts I worked on it," said Johnson, 54. "It still needs some funding to run permanently, but for now we get to enjoy it."
Last year, Johnson and his helpers also fixed the park's water wall, which hadn't been operational in 24 years, he said. They also painted and repaired the park's lampposts.
The work was funded by the Ruth Mott Foundation.
Larry Ford of the DDA said Johnson's work is good news for Flint.
"He's quite a fellow," Ford said. "It looks great."
The fountain was the subject of a 2007 report from a New York consulting firm that suggested lower expectations for Riverbank Park, or at least giving up on resurrecting a couple of major park elements.
The study by Project for Public Spaces said the fountain would be expensive to fix and recommended abandoning the water elements and closing off the park's north-bank lower level for security reasons, according to Flint Journal files.
Johnson, who is a self-described self-taught mechanic, said it's hard to tell what it will cost to fully resurrect the fountain. The electrical room had been 6 feet under water at one point and the pump and switch were broken.
He estimated long-term repairs could cost between $5,000 and $100,000 "depending on what you want to do to it."
He said a complete overhaul would be worth it to help bring life to a once-polluted and scarred riverbank.
Johnson said he moved to Flint from his native Hamtramck 20 years ago, and wants to see it succeed.
"I like Flint," he said. "I like the feel, I like the people."
For some history on Riverbank Park, here's an excerpt from a 1999 Flint Journal story by Dave Graham:
"(In the 1970s) the river was filled with trash: old tires, rusty refrigerators, discarded mattresses and an occasional murder weapon.
Beautification received serious attention when the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers started work on a flood control project downtown that would have turned the stream into a concrete ditch.
Pressure in 1975 from city officials and the new Flint Environmental Action Team Foundation persuaded the Corps to revise the plans to allow for a $22-million beautification scheme, with islands, artworks, fountains and other water features, plus an amphitheater.
Many were wowed when it opened in 1979, but some chuckled when one of its features - a towering, yellow, abstract steel sculpture - toppled in a windstorm just four months later.
The pace of downtown redevelopment picked up when James W. Rutherford was elected mayor in November 1975 to the first of two terms under Flint's restructured strong-mayor form of government.
'A lot of things were going on downtown, including the campus and the riverfront project,' Rutherford said. 'I thought they were good ideas, and I knew we had to do more.'"
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Photo courtesy of Hayward (hope you don't mind). It might have just been started the day you took that photo
Last edited by robk1982; Aug 20, 2009 at 2:29 AM.
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