Opinion

OUR VIEW

Noise and a car wash

Under the vagaries of Forest Park’s arcane zoning laws — most old, tightly-built towns have arcane zoning laws — building a new, amped-up car wash on the exact site of a former car wash on Harlem Avenue was easy. The new Crystal Car Wash, built at a reported cost of $5 million, was grandfathered in. That, even though the new venture was far different — modern, sleek and loaded with free vacuums — than what it replaced.

While the new car wash has seemingly been popular with those of us with dirty cars, it has gone over badly with immediate neighbors who share an alley, and the vacuum noise, with each other.

Now though, Neil Rembos, the owner of the car wash and a civically engaged entrepreneur, has plans to expand the car wash across Lexington Street. That’s good news if you’re ready to see yet another derelict Harlem Avenue single family house being bulldozed. Count us in on that. It’s bad news if the vacuum noise is already infiltrating your home life. And it is interesting because building a car wash expansion on the site of a house is not grandfathered in and will require Crystal Car Wash to make its case to Forest Park’s zoning board. That public process also will allow neighbors to further organize and raise their objections in a public meeting.

The zoning board process could force serious conversations between Rembos and his neighbors on what steps could be taken to mitigate the noise. Some sort of sound barrier in the form of a fence? Change the hours of operation? Charge for vacuums? Not our area of expertise. But the village undoubtedly has a role here as some combination of staff, zoning board volunteers, and the village council needs to mediate these discussions.

Great to see this car wash invest in Forest Park. Great to see them expand and knock down a decrepit house. But neighbors have rights, too, and incessant noise is a real burden.

Oh, the missed CVS opportunity

News that the CVS Pharmacy, awkwardly placed at the back of the lot at Circle and Harlem will close in mid-August isn’t much of a surprise. It has always seemed like an also-ran store with an indifferent staff — though we’d note that criticism could apply to a lot of chain retail these days.

The news, though, does take us back to an ambitious and unfulfilled moment in Forest Park’s economic development history. The parcel containing both the CVS and the Dunkin Donuts, and, if memory serves, what is now Pep Boys, was owned by one local entity. Just to the south the grimy but iconic Nutbush bar and liquor store — iconic as an early gay bar — had closed.

That left the whole block potentially available for redevelopment. There were big ideas from the village for mixed- use retail and housing right at the Green Line. Didn’t happen. A project that needed all the cards to fall in the right way. They didn’t. Soon we’ll be left with an empty mid-sized box.

Small-town Republican values, Navajo culture

Pastor Walter Mitty drove up to Manitowoc last Sunday after church. He liked living in the big city. Most of the time. But lately he found himself daydreaming not only about taking a couple of days away from urban living but also about actually living in a small Wisconsin town like the one in which he grew up.

As usual his sister-in-law Susan and his two nephews greeted him like he was family, which, of course, he was. Spending that year with them while his brother was dying kind of sealed the relational deal.

Conscious of his fantasies, he asked Susan after dinner, “Do you like living in a small community like Manitowoc?”

Susan laughed. “If you live in Valders or Francis Creek, Manitowoc is a big city. I mean, 30,000 people, Walt! But I guess for someone like you living in the middle of nine million people, Manitowoc is a hick town.”

“Seriously, Susan,” said Mitty suddenly feeling a little defensive, “we have professional sports, museums, a world class orchestra, Lollapalooza, Navy Pier, an awesome skyline …”

“Of course,” Susan interrupted, “before he died, Herman and I really enjoyed visiting you, and the view of the skyline from Navy Pier is wonderful. Liked to visit but wouldn’t want to live there.

“See, Herman and I used to get up early in the morning and drive out to Milash Creek, hike to the Lake and watch the sun come up. You remember how the water sparkles like diamonds when the weather is clear.”

“Are you trying to say that all of that cement and steel and glass can’t compare with nature?”

Mitty’s sister-in-law gave that some thought and said, “I guess it’s like the tower of Babel, Walt. The Chicago skyline kind of says, look what we humans can accomplish. Narcissistic in a way. But as you know, 10 minutes from where we are now we can be out in the country, hiking around Maribel Caves or canoeing in Collins Swamp. The beauty I see in those places points to a creative power greater than Louis Sullivan or Frank Lloyd Wright.”

“Wait a minute,” said Mitty laughing, “I’m supposed to be the one giving the sermons here!”

Monday morning he got up while Susan and the boys were still sleeping, picked up a large coffee and one of those egg, sausage and English muffin sandwiches from the new Dunkin Donuts on Calumet Avenue and drove along Lake Shore Drive — the Manitowoc/Two Rivers version of it — to Point Beach State Forest.

He would hike along the beach to the lighthouse and back later, but he liked to begin his visits to Point Beach by parking at the beach at an angle where he could watch the sun come up over the lake. Alone. Before the families in the campground finished breakfast and came to the beach.

And he would pray. Wouldn’t say much of anything. Words seemed inadequate. He understood exactly what Susan was talking about the night before. When he looked at the monumental architecture in the Loop, he would always be impressed, but he never felt loved. Then his mind segued to politics and thought for the thousandth time, “How could a sensitive, religious person like my sister-in-law vote for Trump?!” No longer feeling very prayerful, he picked up the Tony Hillerman novel he’d

TOM been reading, and immediately was transported southwest to Navajo Country. He HOLMES found himself underlining comments the author made about Navajo culture. ■ A Navajo, like a rancher anywhere, would need access to water, to grazing, to a road, and above all a soul-healing view of — in the words of the curing chants — “beauty all around you.” ■ “Really, Jim, Washington’s a nice place,” said Janet Pete, a city Navajo. “It’s cleaner than most cities, and something beautiful every place you look and there’s always …” Jim Chee cut her off. “Beautiful what? Buildings? Monuments? There’s too much smog, too much noise, too much traffic, too damn many people everywhere. You can’t see the stars at night. Too cloudy to see the sunset.” ■ The old Navajo would get up at dawn and roll his wheelchair to the door. Then he would sing the song to Dawn Boy and bless the morning with his pollen. Next he would take a look at his mountain. ■ “I grew up knowing it’s wrong to have more than you need,” Chee explained. “It means you’re not taking care of your people. Win three races in a row, you better slow down a little. Let somebody else win. That doesn’t get you admitted into law school,” Janet said, “Or pull you out of poverty.” “Depends,” Chee replied, “on how you define poverty.” Then Mitty got it . What Susan felt was a kind of an unspoken feeling of not being understood by what Jim Chee referred to as “tree huggers,” members of the Sierra Club who wrote letters to their representatives in Washington about preserving nature, would visit nature “as often as possible,” but would never live in a small town like Francis Creek or even Manitowoc. Susan disliked Trump immensely. Would never want her boys to view him as a role model, but she still felt this community of like-minded people — many of her neighbors in Manitowoc — who voted for Trump, even though the Sermon on the Mount in no way informed his values. She liked Joe and Jill a lot but it seemed like they felt sorry for people like her; like he could not understand how she, a single parent trying to pay the bills with what she made working at the bakery, was happy and wouldn’t move away from Manitowoc to Chicago even if her income doubled.

Need resident voices on car wash

(Editor’s note: The letter writer makes a fair point about the lack of voices of neighbors adjacent to the Crystal Car Wash on Harlem. In his column today on page 3, John Rice interviews a neighbor who expresses her concerns over the noise generated.)

Your paper typically seems to cover both sides of a story so I was distressed to read about the constant nuisance violations the Village of Forest Park allows the Crystal Car Wash at 901 S. Harlem to impose on our neighborhood. Not one resident was contacted or interviewed to provide our perspective on this issue. I am writing to represent the views of Concerned Citizens for Code Compliance (CC4CC). We are a group of residents impacted by the constant noise and increased traffic this business has created and we are despondent over the lack of response from our village.

The article makes a point of the investment made on the business property as an improvement to the neighborhood. We learn from your article that businesses are not required to comply with village codes put in place after they existed. Residents have also committed substantial investments in our homes and we comply with every village ordinance regardless of when it was put in place. The article informs us of a future Zoning Board Meeting for their expansion across the street but we were never informed of any such meeting regarding the substantial changes made to the car wash made by the new owner. Our FOIA requests demonstrate no Zoning Board Meeting was held allowing them to increase the number of vacuums from 3 to 24 and place over half of them along the residents’ side with no sound barrier or abatement material on the now much taller building. Allowing an additional 150 feet of access and increased hours 7 a.m. to 9 p.m. 365 days a year with free vacuums advertised by a lighted sign has increased traffic in our alley by hundreds of cars a day. No sound test or traffic studies were performed. Yet it is because of these changes that the business now routinely violates every section of the nuisance code. Why didn’t the village at least make them build a wall around the property like in every other community where these businesses exist? The article quotes a village official stating the business owner and the neighbors should work it out on our own. What does that mean? How exactly does that work? What does the village suggest a group of aggrieved citizens do on our own to obtain compliance to codes the officials wrote and approved? What leverage or authority do neighbors have to make them comply? To suggest that residents take matters into their own hands is absurd. Are we supposed offer a bribe or pay the Crystal Car Wash to comply? Do we blare speakers to play music louder than their customers do? Do we obtain 150 feet of property next door to Neil Rembos’ home with a big sign so people who come for free stuff can urinate on his property? Since the village official mentioned does not reply to any of my emails perhaps your paper could find out what he means by that statement and then inform us of what we can do to enforce the village nuisance code on a non-compliant business.

Mark Denny Forest Park

elping of Need a helping of

Consider Altenheim’s value as storms intensify

The former Altenheim property contains 11 acres of which 8 would be developed under the plan. That entire 11-acre area therefore could presently in theory contain up to 298,694 gallons of water in a single one-inch rainfall event. Open land helps to absorb large event rainfalls and help reduce the possibility of over stressing storm sewers and preventing flooding of private properties. The storm sewer systems are built to handle normal events, but we are having more abnormal rainfalls each decade: what were once 10-year events are now occurring more frequently. Having open land for absorption of storm water becomes a critical component when these 10-year weather events occur.

Of course there is also the issue of our underground water table, and the storage of water in our soils for long term environmental health. if we average the wettest and driest years in Chicago, we get 36.54-inches of rain; a 2011 Chicago Tribune statistic shows 35.82 as an average, the numbers are similar, so we can go with that lower number.

One acre-inch of rain equals 3,630 cubic feet or 27,154 gallons. So multiplying that 298,694 gallons times the 35.82 statistic gives us a total average annual rainfall of 10,699,219.08 gallons on that 11-acre property. That’s over 10 and a half million gallons of water that is currently captive on this undeveloped site that would potentially need to be absorbed by the Forest Park storm system and spread over Forest Park over the course of a year! If that area is developed, the risk increases that that event water will flow into our basements or yards or streets is increased. If the entirety of the eight acres is developed, that leaves only three acres of open space to absorb a discharge of 7,781,250 gallons over the course of a year. …

A one-inch rainfall event over the entirety of Forest Park represents 41,708,544 gallons of water. Much of Forest Park is impervious surface: roads, sidewalks, roofs. Without knowing the exact percentage of permeable to impermeable surface, or each surface’s degree of permeability, we can safely consider that much of that will be discharged rather than absorbed.

By developing 8 acres of the 11 of the Altenheim property, we are adding more gallons of water – that’s almost 8 million gallons of water! - to our storm sewers and basements. Is this in the public good? Will the additional tax revenue from the currently proposed development benefit the community as a whole? Is the developer being asked to construct the property in a manner that uses best practices for water management such as permeable surfaces? The village council needs to consider all these things when making a decision regarding new development of open land in respect to all of our homes in the village. Are there ways to offset this water accumulation aside from environmentally unfriendly detention basins? Yes. Work by Conservation Design Forum, who designed Chicago City Hall’s green roof, has shown us that this is possible. And necessary, if we are determined to go that route.

In the meantime, let’s please consider what each of us can do to mitigate flooding, while continuing to hold our officials accountable regarding the writing and enforcement of reasonable regulations for developers. Lawns vary in their degrees of permeability, but rain gardens and nativeplant-rich gardens are a resourceful way to absorb and divert runoff. These and other solutions should be incorporated before permits are written.

Any development of the former Altenheim property needs to take into account the needs of the entire village including management of storm water, pollution, safety, and meeting state and federal water management initiatives. Planned and approved development must include provision for rainfall to be considered a resource and not a waste product if we are fulfilling our long-term community responsibility and not just our short-term financial revenues. If we don’t, we will end up with something that will cost us time and money wasted in pumping sewage out of our basements with a net loss of property value rather than gain.

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