Colorado River's Big Sur

Is a standing wave that only occurs when the flow rate gets above 20,000 cfs.

It has been at about 30,000 cfs recently.

DenverPost reports: Once-in-a-generation wave continues in Debeque Canyon

With waves surging to nearly head high, strong surfers can ride the never-ending wave nonstop for more than an hour on uncrowded days.

[via AdventureJournal]

The article mentions a person who has made the 4-hour round-trip from Vail four times this month.

Message boards indicate people from Utah and Montana are making the trip to experience this wave. Even a person in Connecticut is going west to surf in the Colorado River.

This kind of dedication is why a whitewater park in downtown Traverse City seems like a great idea.

A Great Lakes Experience

Is Unsalted - A documentary on surfing the Great Lakes.



There are people who don't mind driving eight hours for maybe three hours of potential surfing.

Via Adventure Journal: More Core than Core: Surfing the Great Lakes

But a whitewater park provides steady conditions year-round and can be designed to accommodate surfers.

A whitewater park would give Traverse City another destination experience.

Yampa River, Downtown Steamboat Springs

Photo by John F. Russell

Water rolls over Charlie’s Hole on the Yampa River in front of Bud Werner Memorial Library. The hole is a popular spot for local kayakers this time of year, and has become a draw for swimmers and people who enjoy being around water in summer.

Boardman River, downtown Traverse City


Via wikipedia

Doesn't look like a blue ribbon trout stream to me.

The Steamboat library sits at the edge of downtown and patrons enjoy watching the kayakers and fly anglers as they read. And this one river with its quasi-whitewater park brings $7.2 million to the Steamboat Springs economy each year.

In Traverse City we do a decent job of hiding the Boardman River in concrete and parking lots.

The Boardman deserves better.

The Few, The Proud, The Cold Weather Surfers

People who surf the Great Lakes in the winter are different. They are fanatical. They are obsessive. Or as the Lake County News Chronicle from Two Harbors says "the fanatics from the Superior Surf Club who will drop everything to catch good waves". (See: Catching a cold wave)

And this is the value in establishing a whitewater/surf park downtown on the Boardman River. It would create a year-round downtown destination for people from all over the midwest who were in search of getting their wave fix.

This is why I support the Traverse City Whitewater Park.

Build It And They Will Come

Surfers are known as people who will chase waves - going to where they need to be for the experience.

The recent October wind storm brought people to the Great Lakes for the surfing experience. See: High winds bring surfers to city

And a Canadian writer describes their trip to Lake Michigan for some late season surfing. See: Chill thrill: November is the best month for surfing on Lake Michigan

People are obviously willing to travel for the experience of good waves. Imagine what an always available Traverse City Whitewater park would do for tourism!

Why Not Whitewater?

Traverse City Whitewater has a page at Facebook now. Join it. A recent posting indicates they are just about to form a non-profit but need board members and volunteers.

I recently read an article that pointed out how something as simple as a single standing wave can make a city a destination. See MIL: Surfing In Munich

Here's a video from this park in Munich. Why not Traverse City? Look at the crowds watching these people surf. This would be a huge draw for downtown:

Parks

I started this post back in December, and after seeing Gary's post: Do you know where your closest city park is? which includes a map of Traverse City parkland, I decided I should get this wrapped up.

The big news is each Traverse City bay is poised to get revamped parks. The Acme Shoreline Park has a goal of turning one mile of East Bay into a blue mile of beachfront with volleyball courts, a playground, public marina, and open space; all connected to a TART trail spur.

See the Record-Eagle: Shoreline site in Acme to become new park

For West Bay, there is much hope for a completely new bayfront to connect downtown Traverse City to the water.

The new Bayfront Park design was recently revealed. See: bayfront plans are done

The conceptualization hits many highlights for me including a natural play area, an artesian spring and stream, an improved boat launch that will be friendlier to canoes and kayaks, more vegetation, keeping the emergent wetland at the mouth of the Boardman, dark-sky compliant lighting, fish cleaning station, improved access to the park with tunnels, etc.

However, it does appear that this was a great opportunity to develop a dedicated Farmer's Market space in the area but it isn't in the final plans. Also, to make the area more inviting to visitors of all types harness the artesian well in such a way so that boaters and others could fill up their containers with potable water. Much like how travelers stop north of Petoskey on US 31 to fill up with the well by the side of the road there. And I am not sure we need so many roundabouts but that is a topic for another post. You can't have it all I suppose.

I believe a new Bayfront will be a great addition to Traverse City and could serve as a multi-modal hub for the entire region. I hope it gets done. Even better would be tying this in to re-naturalizing the Boardman as it goes through downtown and then tie that into a whitewater park between Cass and Union.

Grand Rapids is trying it. (Grand River as downtown Grand Rapids whitewater course?)

There is a Facebook group for the Traverse City Boardman River Whitewater Park effort.

For more on the Bayfront park see:
TC bayfront plans take a step forward

Bayfront overhaul work could begin in 2011

Next, Traverse City residents clearly want a dog park. Recently in the paper there was this: Dog park project may be in the works

And when Mayor Bzdok made this post: Update for the week of November 29 to December 6 there were many comments from people wanting a dog park.

Not only would an off-leash dog park be good for the dogs but dog-walkers are great to have in the neighborhood. As mentioned in Why dog owners make the best citizens

After dark, the streets fill with dog walkers. A couple per block, at least. In the winter, they're the only people on the streets. Without them, the neighborhood would be lot emptier, and the streets would feel a lot more forbidding. Placing a couple of poodles -- and my neighborhood has a lot of poodles -- on the landscape really does wonders

I have the spot - next to the trail between Oryana and the library. An area some people are calling Old Town Park. My idea is a dog park on one side and let the other side which is already being used by beavers, rabbits, red-winged blackbirds, fox, be allowed to develop naturally. Build a high wall/fence next to the apartments to mitigate noise, though I believe the benefits to those residents having a place to exercise their dog outweighs any negatives.

I like this location because:
- it is centrally located to Traverse City's neighborhoods
- getting dog walkers in this area should help with the graffiti on the Community Sailing building and loitering on the bridge
- Oryana and McGough's should see increased sales of their pet supplies if dog owners are in the area more

And the natural area is important because it will act as a buffer when rail travel returns to the area.

Map (blue line is the park, other line is the natural area):

View Traverse City Dog Park? in a larger map

Finally, parks are great, but without a trail system connecting them (I've heard it described as a "string of pearls") it will not reach its full potential. So I hope that whatever is done is planned with TART so that all of these parks can be reached by non-motorized means.

Additional reading for inspiration:
INFRA: The Best New Urban Parks

NYT: Blueprints for a Better ‘Burb

The Colorado Town That Grew Around A Whitewater Park

This story is indicative of what Traverse City could do in the Midtown area along the Boardman River.

See GOOD: Urban Pastoral: Taking the city to the suburbs

And doesn't this sound like Traverse City:

Buena Vista gave the go-ahead, to the chagrin of some town old-timers who believed, as Katie used to, that all development was evil. They liked Buena Vista precisely because it never changed, so even smart growth was bad growth in their eyes

The idea of a downtown Traverse City whitewater park is not that crazy. See NorthernExpress: A Whitewater Park for Traverse City?