Down Chicago’s Drain

Recreation on the River

Fri, 20 Aug 2010 10:46:57 -0600

Will the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District finally be forced to clean up the Chicago River? According to a recent Chicago Tribune article, a meeting earlier this month by the Illinois Pollution Control Board changed the official designation of areas of the river to include recreational use. Previously the MWRD has refused to disinfect wastewater discharged from its sewage treatment plants under the Catch-22 assumption that if the Chicago River was too polluted for recreational boating, it was not necessary to fully treat the discharged water since no recreational users were being affected. An infographic published with the article charts the astoundingly high levels of colony-forming units (CFUs) of fecal-coliform bacteria in the North Branch of the Chicago and the Little Calumet Rivers downstream from two of the three metro sewage plants (the channel next to the largest Stickney sewage plant is an industrial shipping channel not generally used for recreational boating). Apologists at the MWRD point out that disinfecting the wastewater discharged into the river will not fully clean the waterway, because it is still subject to Combined Sewage Outflows (CSOs) during heavy rainstorms, when rainwater overloads the underground pipes and combined sewage and stormwater must be released into the river so that it does not back up into nearby basements. The engineering solution to that problem, the Deep Tunnel which is supposed to capture overload water, is still years away from completion, even 38 years after the project started.

Plastic Across the Pacific

Wed, 28 Jul 2010 10:25:03 -0600

The Plastiki, a catamaran made from recycled plastic bottles, has finally arrived in Sydney, Australia after 130 days sailing from San Francisco. The boat will be open for tours for the next several weeks, and you can read about the adventure on the Plastiki blog: www.theplastiki.com

Send those fish back

Tue, 13 Jul 2010 23:35:43 -0600

Governor Pat Quinn announced a deal today to export up to 30 million pounds of Asian Carp to China. A fish processing plant in downstate Pearl, IL will be expanded using $2 million of state funds.

Chicago River Wrap-Up

Sun, 11 Jul 2010 23:54:11 -0600

Chicagoist provides a concise summary of how plans to stop the Asian Carp are tied to the future of the Chicago River. Also, an excellent two-part article in the Milwaukee Journal Sentinel which tells the history of the Chicago River, its current degraded state and how the river is still connected to the growth of the region. Chicago and Milwaukee have thrown insults at each other in the past over each city's stewardship of Lake Michigan. Politicians in Chicago blame Milwaukee for beach closures whenever a storm overflows Milwaukee's sewer system into the lake. In civilized Illinois, the implication is, we don't dump sewage back into the same lake where we get our drinking water. But as the Journal Sentinel article shows, Chicago's ability to drain its waste away from the city, out of sight, has allowed it to dump far more untreated sewage into the environment than Milwaukee ever does, by sending it all downstream and out of mind.

Re-reversal of the Chicago River

Sun, 27 Jun 2010 13:14:38 -0600

Last week's discovery of a carp in Lake Calumet has added extra urgency to plans for separating the Great Lakes and Illinois River ecosystems. At the Shedd Aquarium on Friday Senator Dick Durbin announced a bill to be introduced this week that will force the Army Corps of Engineers to study the possibilities of physically separating the Chicago and Calumet rivers from the Illinois River (which would require re-reversing their flow back to Lake Michigan). The costs for such a project will be enormous, as well as the costs of transferring shipping across the barricade. But the danger to the Great Lakes ecosystem is equally great.

Scrappers, the Movie

Thu, 24 Jun 2010 10:06:19 -0600

The Scrappers movie is finally screening! It will make its world premiere at the Chicago Underground Film Festival on Sunday June 27, as well as on Thursday July 1.

A bit closer to the lake

Wed, 23 Jun 2010 09:57:23 -0600

On Tuesday a lone Bighead Carp was discovered during population sampling in Lake Calumet. The fish is well beyond the electric barricade set up to stop invasive species from accessing Lake Michigan. Whether the dreaded Asian Carp has made it into the lake and will be able to establish a breeding population remains to be seen.

St. Louie or Bust - 1

Thu, 03 Jun 2010 00:20:07 -0600

Mike and I are reprising our trashboat journey with a bike trip following the Illinois River to St. Louis. I'll be taking the train home from St. Louis, while Mike continues on biking solo to California. After a lazy start, we leave my backyard garden behind, with a tail-wind pushing us south all the way! Leaving Chicago, we follow old Route 66 out of the city. Rolling on past my favorite, Snuffy's Grill, we opt for a lunch stop on an abandoned section of highway in the shade of overgrown trees. This section of Route 66 was closed in 1998 after quarries on each side of the road started to undermine the road. Looking over the edge it's a long way down! Its surprising to see such topography after just leaving flat Chicago. In the distance beyond the quarry we can see the line of the Des Plaines River where we floated our trashboat downstream in an epic flood. The presence of limestone not far under the soil here no doubt accounts for the rapids we encountered a few miles down river. Making our way south on city streets, rural highways and bike paths, we finally make it to our first small town outside the city, Lockport. The town was once the headquarters of the I&M Canal, which opened to barge shipping all the way upstream from St. Louis to Chicago in 1848. A quiet remnant of the canal is still here, at the start of a bike path that we will follow west for 80 miles. Hurrying through Joliet as the afternoon wears on, we cross the wide Des Plaines River on an old iron bascule bridge, and pass the riverfront tavern where we ended our trashboat journey three years ago. Too bad we are in too much of a hurry to stop in for a drink and to see if Keith, the riverman we met back then, was still around. Due to our late start, we end up racing the sunset to camp even with the longest daylight of the year. After a water stop in Channahon, we make it to McKinley Woods, for some secret off-trail camping. A picturesque stone overlook built by the Civilian Conservation Corps gives us an escape from the mosquitos while we eat dinner, and there's time for a refreshing swim in the river. Across the dark water, behind an island, the Kankakee comes in from the south, merging with the Des Plaines to birth the united Illinois River at this point.

Swimming in the Chicago River

Wed, 02 Jun 2010 15:06:21 -0600

The Chicago Tribune reports today on a surprise letter sent to the state of Illinois, the EPA and Obama administration recommended that the Chicago River be made clean enough for swimming. Environmental groups have long argued that water from sewage treatment plants must be disinfected before it is discharged into the river. Wastewater from these plants is the primary source of harmful bacteria in the river, as well as drainage pipes carrying combined sewage and storm runoff which overflow into the river when filled with rainwater, pictured in the chart above. The Metropolitan Water Reclamation District has argued that the extra electricity required to disinfect wastewater will increase carbon emissions leading to global warming. Mayor Daley responded to the EPA letter with annoyance that the feds might interfere in local politics. But if the extra attention from Washington helps clean up the Chicago river, what's wrong with that?

Bikes by Boat / Boats by Bike

Tue, 06 Apr 2010 15:31:19 -0600

Momentum Magazine #44 (page 48) featured a small item with a photo of Eric Parsons of Anchorage, Alaska, paddling an inflatable Pakraft loaded with a Surly Pugsley across an Alaskan fjord. On land the Pakraft can be rolled into a small bag and carried on the bike's handlebars, while on water the bike can be ferried at the front of the small boat. The bike's fat frame and wide tires even allow it to float if it falls overboard.

Plastiki Set to Sail

Tue, 09 Mar 2010 21:12:33 -0600

Inhabitat reports that the Plastiki is finally launched, and waiting to set sail this spring from San Francisco across the Pacific to Sydney. The catamaran is built from 12,500 recycled two-liter bottles and plastic sheets. The 7500-mile journey to Australia kinda puts our 50-mile trip to Joliet to shame. I'll look forward to at least joining the voyage, arm-chair fashion, by reading along online.

The Dirt on Recycling

Sun, 07 Mar 2010 15:04:41 -0600

A NY Times article reports that contracts for Chicago's new separate-source recycling program are being awarded to the same politically connected haulers who made millions off the failed Blue Bag recycling program of the 1990s. Some of them are even the same insiders who scammed millions off the city in the Hired Truck scandal.

Cost of Closing the Canal

Sat, 20 Feb 2010 10:19:39 -0600

Two transportation experts from Michigan are disputing the projected costs of blocking the Illinois Waterway, as claimed by Illinois and government officials. According to the LA Times article, more than 3800 loaded barges pass through the O'Brien Lock yearly, which is located on the Calumet river and is the primary shipping channel connecting the Great Lakes to the Illinois River. The two analysts claim that the $70 million loss to trade of transferring cargo by truck or rail over the closed lock is small in comparison to the $7 billion fishing industry which will be devastated if Asian Carp make it upstream into Lake Michigan. If the lock is closed, I have my doubts that cargo will simply be transferred from barge to truck to boat to hurdle over the barrier. Closing the lock will disrupt barge and towboat traffic along the canal, but how much of the traffic passing through the lock is headed for distant ports? The barges of the canal are not headed out onto Lake Michigan, and the great ocean-going ships are too large to head very far downstream. How much cargo really will be affected if the locks are closed? One other type of traffic that will be affected if the locks are closed are the pleasure boats and tour boats. And will the Chicago Harbor Lock at the mouth of the Chicago River be affected as well? Tour boat operators are fighting against closing the locks as well.

Radio Journey on the Mekong

Wed, 17 Feb 2010 11:02:11 -0600

NPR is running a nice series this week on the Mekong River. Michael Sullivan travels from the headwaters in Tibet all the way down the the delta in Vietnam, talking about the history of the river as well as its current ecological conditions.

Covered in Dust

Tue, 16 Feb 2010 22:10:15 -0600

Here's our sturdy Water Bug trash boat, covered in dust. What to do with it? For the last two years it has been resting in a storage area at JPUSA, but Mike tells me the area will soon be remodelled and built out into a church space. All this junk needs to go! So what should we do with the boat? It would be great to fix it up and take it out on the water again, but I have no place to store it, and in any case it will be several months before the weather is warm enough for any boat trips. To think of all the work we put into building it, it would be a shame to toss it out to the scrappers, but I'm not sure what other options we have.