The much-anticipated drainage improvements for Flossmoor’s Berry Lane have been completed. Now, all that remains is the parkway restoration scheduled for this spring and a true test of the neighborhood’s increased stormwater capacity.
“Not that we want a big storm, but we want to see a good gullywasher come through — a good 6-7 inch storm — to see what happens and how it reacts to it,” said John Brunke, the village’s public works director.
While the village has only had an inch of rain here or there since the main work on Berry Lane was completed in December, the expectation is that the large storm sewer and stormwater storage installed under the aggregate subbase will provide immediate relief from the flooding woes that have plagued the neighborhood for decades. It will also play into the bigger flood relief picture in the village, which includes plans for work on the Flossmoor Road viaduct. That is Flossmoor’s biggest flood priority, and Berry drains to that area, Brunke explained.
“By putting the storage in, that will help the viaduct indirectly from sending so much water to it right away,” he said.
The Berry Lane drainage improvements — on the north end of Heather Hill, including Berry Lane, Bob-o-Link Road and Maryland Avenue — were made in collaboration with the Army Corps of Engineers.
In addition to the sewer and storage, crews installed permeable street pavers, a first for the area. Brunke said the village will be keeping an eye on how well the pavers work and may do more of that in the future if all goes according to plan.
Brunke said those pavers did get a small test of snow around Christmas. They were plowed by a truck with a new rubber blade that is only used in that neighborhood to protect the pavers, and it went well, according to Brunke.
Brunke said parkway restoration is slated for March or April, after a summer strike at Thornton’s limestone quarry delayed the original schedule.
“If we didn’t have that quarry strike, we probably would have had the job done this fall, but those eight weeks are really what pushed it back and forced the restoration to go into the spring,” Brunke said. “We were really fighting to get everything wrapped up as we did, with all of the … concrete and asphalt work by December. After that, we pretty much ran out of time.
“It could be worse. We could still have a road that’s half open, which would be bad for the winter.”
Mayor Michelle Nelson said the streets, curbs and sidewalks look “gorgeous,” and more importantly the immediate impact the work should have is important to the residents who live on that end of Heather Hill.
“It’s a huge relief,” she said of having the main work done. “Residents lived in fear of major rainfalls. … To have this road, this system, repaired to accommodate these bigger downpours we’re seeing these days, the more frequent downpours we’re seeing, we’re lifting a huge burden for residents over on that street.”
Jim Himmel has been living on Berry Lane since his family moved to Flossmoor in 1966. And the flooding problems he has seen in the neighborhood date back almost as far.
“I bought a canoe in 1969,” Himmel said. “We were flooding at that point. I had my canoe on our street. That’s how much water we had. I could canoe from almost one end of where they paved it to the other end. That’s how deep the water was. We’ve always had that problem.”
Though a bigger sewer was installed on the street years ago, it did little to alleviate flooding, he said. With Berry Lane at the bottom of Heather Hill, all the water flows there, he noted.
“We’ve had nothing but trouble over the years,” Himmel said. “People have been complaining for years, and the village said there was nothing they could do about it, or they tried to do something about it and blamed some of it on Butterfield Creek. This is the first time they’ve really gone to the extent that they have.”
And Himmel said he is more optimistic this time around. The plan makes sense, he said, with bigger sewers and the concept of pavers where the water will seep right off the street into the rocks beneath. He added that the street, curbs, sidewalks and fire hydrants look beautiful.
“They did a very good job,” he said. “I feel much better now. We’ll see what happens in the spring.”
Lillie Lacey, who lives on Berry Lane, attended the groundbreaking ceremony in May and said the project was a long time coming. Over the course of three mayoral administrations, she appealed to the village with photos, emails, texts and phone calls before seeing some flood relief on Berry Lane.
“That has been a full-time experience since I’ve been here,” Lacey said.
She used to see children standing on the corner with water over their ankles, trying to figure out how to get home. She hopes that better days are ahead for her neighborhood.
“It looks beautiful now,” Lacey said. “The pavers look very nice. We’re happy to have the new curbs and sewers and preferably a better flooding situation.”
The entire cost of the project was estimated at $2.91 million. Flossmoor has secured more than $2 million in grants from the Army Corps of Engineers, Illinois Environmental Protection Agency and the Metropolitan Water Reclamation District of Greater Chicago. The Army Corps’ grant comes with an educational component that includes signs on both sides of the block explaining the project to people, how permeable pavers work and why they are there.
“I hope people will stop and check out the signs,” Nelson said. “I hope they will bring their kids by, so they can learn about infrastructure and these improvements that we’ve made to make the village a beautiful place.”
Berry Lane is just one of several projects designed to mitigate flooding in several neighborhoods and the Flossmoor Road viaduct. The overall scope of the work is expected to have a positive impact downstream of the viaduct, as well. For the project, Flossmoor reviewed options before setting on regional detention.
“We looked at a lot of options for what to do with the flood water and ultimately decided that taking care of it within the village versus dumping it into a stream that would carry it to another village and create problems for somebody else, we decided it was more responsible to deal with it within the village rather than pass it off to somebody else downstream,” Nelson said.
During the Flossmoor Village Board’s Dec. 19 meeting, Trustee Gary Daggett praised the Berry Lane project.
“I had an opportunity to drive down Berry Lane and work through that whole neighborhood and check out the work that was done,” he said. “It’s actually very impressive what was done. I know it took a lot longer because of some of the quarry strikes, but it’s really cool to see the progress that’s been made. Hopefully for the folks over at Berry Lane it makes a world of a difference and they’re not putting on boots to walk to their car when we get the heavy rains.”
Brunke added that Flossmoor also recently found out that it won an award from the Southwest Branch of the American Public Works Association Chicago Metro Chapter for Project of the Year for an Environment project under $5 million. But he, too, said the biggest thing is that residents are excited about the new street and the flood relief it should provide the neighborhood.
“There were a lot of inconveniences, headaches for them during the work that was going on — roads being closed, digging in front of their houses,” Brunke said. “But I think once it was all complete, they’re all very happy it was wrapped up. They’re excited about it.”
The next step: tackling the viaduct, Brunke said. The hope is that construction can start by next year on that flood mitigation project.