| SOS to green Evans Street Bank Failure by JP Brunet Mark Saturday June 5 on your calendar. The bank failure on Evans St. will be the site of our Annual Greening or planting event. While the failure has been recognized as a majore one by Rivers & Streams, forcing the city to literally shutdown Evans St., there is no money for its repair. The site begs for little TLC that SOS hopes to provide by planting trees on June 5th. SOS has recently received funding of $16,000 from Manitoba Hydro for the restoration of the corridor between Marion St. and Bishop Grandin. SOS hopes to accomplish half of this - the restoration of Marion to Fermor this summer. The Evans site is by far worst site in this section requiring the most attention. City Naturalist Cheryl Heming is proposing some rather radical bio-engineering methods to tackle the age-old problem of riverbank stabilization. Accomplished by driving rooting cottonwood and willow posts directly into the bank, the thick mat of the root system acts like re-bar to prevent further erosion. Manitoba Habitat Corporation is the agency promoting this alternative here in the province. The Evans St. site could become a pilot project that would be completed in the fall using these methods. June 5th, volunteers are asked again to pack a lunch, bring work gloves, boots, a shovel and a pail. Those of you with only a couple of hours to spare on this day are more than welcome. |