City looks at spring spruce up

Roosevelt Park, Riverside Park, Seventh St. canal, tagged for improvements.

With the early season change the Spring bug has hit nearly everyone, including city officials. With the next 600 feet of walking trail well underway, Hebron City Councilman Kurk Wiedel has turned his sights to other areas of the city, especially Roosevelt Park.

“We need to do something with that bear,” he noted at the council meeting in March. “It would be nice to have rocks and a water feature – a fountain or something.”

He’d also like to change the flower bed that runs along the north side of the park parallel to the alley. “It’s got some nice tulips in there and other plants, but it collects a lot of trash and weeds.”

Wiedel said he’d like to replace the plants that are already there with rock and shrubs that won’t require upkeep and he’d like to use sales tax dollars to do it. The bear and the flower bed would be considered community improvement, he said.

The 1,240 square-foot bed would cost approximately $5,000 to excavate, level out and put down a weed barrier, rocks and plants. $2,000 of that is labor, he said.

“The bear would cost much more,” he explained. “It would run somewhere in the neighborhood of $13,000-$25,000, depending on what we want to do.”

Another area of concern is the culvert at the corner of Seventh St., and Duffield Ave. Over a year ago, all the trees were removed from the drainage area that runs through the back yards of several neighbors. Wiedel told city officials they need to decide what to do with it. “The neighbors don’t want cedar trees in there, but they are willing to have creeping junipers, and pear and apple trees.

The drainage ditch was cleared through a miscommunication between the city, neighborhood residents and a tree trimming service. Now the city is faced with possible erosion issues as well as making the area more pleasing to look at. “It will take 55 creeping junipers and seven pear and apple trees to spruce it up,” Wiedel said. “We may need to bring in some dirt, too.” Estimated cost of the project may run $1,500.

And finally, the city would like to plant 27 trees at Riverside Park and the campground area to fill in open areas and improve the look. The trees would most likely cost $7,000.

While the city officials did not make a decision about the suggested spruce ups, plans are to investigate ways to bring natural beauty back to areas in need.