June 19--About 2,000 feet of Lake Michigan shoreline has been protected against crashing waves under a project to replace aging erosion safeguards.
Officials announced Friday that a stretch of lakefront from Irving Park Road to Montrose Avenue is the latest completed segment of the project, aimed at improving infrastructure along 9.5 miles of shoreline. It's a joint effort of the city, the Chicago Park District and the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers.
"Chicagoans consistently rank Lake Michigan as one of Chicago's most important assets, and we must continue our long history of protecting this beautiful resource," said U.S. Sen. Dick Durbin (D-Ill.) in a news release about the project.
Chicago's shoreline historically was protected from waves and storms by wooden cribs full of rocks and other rubble, said Jeff Heath, who is managing the project for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Some of those structures date back 75 to 100 years, he said.
"At the time, it was cutting edge," he said. "A hundred years in a shoreline is a long time to last ... [but] eventually over 100 years the wood rots out, the stones start toppling out into the lake."
In 2012, the safeguards couldn't hold out against a particularly vicious storm that washed out a running path near Montrose Harbor, Heath said. That path has been restored as part of this phase of the project, which began in 2013.
To protect against erosion, stones weighing up to 5 tons have been strategically placed along the shoreline to weaken crashing waves, Heath said. Without them, people wouldn't have safe access to the lake, Heath said, and Lake Shore Drive could be dangerous.
The Irving Park to Montrose section of the restoration cost about $12.7 million, Heath said. In total, reconstruction will cost about $536 million, according to Durbin's office. Costs are split between the city, the Chicago Park District, the state Department of National Resources and the Army Corps of Engineers.
The full project is expected to be completed in 2019.
mcrepeau@redeyechicago.com
