Trail Talk

I just got a copy of Trail Talk, a nifty little brochure put out by the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County. It will fit in your top pocket, but gives quite a bit of info as to what is in the preserves and various statistics that you might want to know. For instance, last year there were about 3.1 million visitors to our preserves. That only comes from a car count, so if you are riding your bike to the preserves, or are lucky enough to be able to walk to one, then your were not counted.

The District has 310 full-time employees and 45 part-timers. We had 3436 volunteers contribute some 79,000+ hours of there time to doing various things around the District. That equates to over $1 million of benefits to every citizen of DuPage County. We have 60 named preserves, with a few additional parcels that are generally referred to by the name of the nearest preserve. 2 of our preserves are dedicated Illinois Nature Preserves. We have 3 golf courses, 5 youth campgrounds, 1 youth cabin, 1 family campground, 4 model aircraft fields, 1 model boat area, 7 off-leash dog areas, we run 5 education facilities, have 2 more run by outside groups, and quite a bit more. It even has tax information.

Who woulda guessed that we have just under 400 miles of property boundaries. Or that we have 67 parking lots. Or 1450 picnic tables. Or...

Dunham Forest Preserve

If you have been to the Forest Preserve District of DuPage County's website recently, you may have noticed the Dunham Forest Preserve Conceptual Master Plan. If you have a few minutes you might want to check out the 11 page document. It provides all sorts of information from the history of the site to the vision the District has for what it can become.

Some features include a parking lot adjacent to a property owned by Wayne where they will move the historic railroad station. The lot will help provide additional parking for the rr museum and provide a trail head into the preserve. A gravel trail will proceed south of the lot to Braemore Dr. and Cornerstone Lakes Park. A pedestrian/equestrian trail will circle the preserve through various restoration areas. Ultimately, it should be a very peaceful preserve.

Now we just have to see how much it will cost.

Farms To Forests

The current issue of Naperville Magazine has a brief article about... yours truly. March 2007 issue, page 14. It starts by drawing a connection between my Grandfather as the DuPage farm advisor for the University of Illinois and me as a horticulturist and Forest Preserve Commissioner. Hence the title of the story. And there is a decent photo of me over the text. So if you haven't received one in the mail, run out to Anderson's Books or Barnes and Noble to get your copy. They're going fast.