The Minneapolis Park and Recreation Board’s renovation of Lake of the Isles, underway since 2001 (following several years of planning), is nearing completion. A massive and costly undertaking, the project has restored this beloved park known for its picturesque beauty. Poor soils around the lake, coupled with ever-increasing urban runoff and the devastating rain events of the late 1990s, had created a situation in which pathways and parkland were under water much of the year. In addition, erosion of an unstable shoreline had seriously degraded the lake’s water quality. Over the last eight years, the MPRB stabilized the lake’s shoreline, restored and enhanced wetland areas, reconstructed the paths, restored upland plants and elevated recreation areas to make the park once again beautiful and usable as well as sustainable. With the completion of tree planting this spring, parkway repaving this summer, and island restoration throughout the year, the Lake of the Isles renovation project is virtually complete.
Lake of the Isles Restoration Photos
Parkway Repaving and Bridge Repair
City Public Works is making preparations for repaving the parkway this summer. A public information meeting was held March 30 to provide information to area residents regarding such details as paving schedules and detours. Councilmember Lisa Goodman has formed a committee composed of two members from each of the four neighborhoods that will be affected by the repaving project. Committee members will act as a liaison to their respective neighborhoods during the course of the repaving. For further information regarding the parkway repaving call the street maintenance section of Public Works at 612-673-3759.
Beginning with the Calhoun Lagoon bridge, Park Board crews have been tuckpointing and performing other general maintenance on the Lake of the Isles Parkway bridges. When the tuckpointing is complete, crews will focus on the sidewalk areas, cleaning up the stone and caulking the joints. Bridge maintenance work will not hinder traffic on Lake of the Isles Parkway or on the bike and pedestrian trails.
The bridge decks were repaved with concrete last fall, in preparation for the upcoming parkway paving. The new decking is expected to last for as long as 50 years.
Back to top
March Island Cleanup; Spring and Beyond Planting
Completing work that began last summer, forestry crews in early March cut selected half-fallen trees, buckthorn and other invasive plants, burning the cut material in controlled fires. Shrubs will be planted along the perimeter of the islands this spring. Treatment of invasive species will continue on the islands this spring and fall. Native trees and shrubs will then be planted inland on the islands this fall or in the spring of 2010. If native species can get a good start, the hope is that they will prevent the many persistent invasive species trying to take over the islands, especially on Raspberry Island. The planting plan for the restoration of the islands was presented at a public meeting in May 2008, offering area residents and park users the opportunity to review the plan, ask questions and make suggestions. Both Mike’s Island and Raspberry Island will continue to be designated as wildlife refuges as identified in the approved lake of the Isles master plan, and as such are not, and will not be, open for public use or programming.
Back to top
Spring Tree Planting
Trees to be planted this spring by MPRB forestry crews will complete implementation of the approved planting plan begun on Arbor Day 2008. Two-hundred-eighty trees will be planted, including two varieties of disease resistant elm, Valley Forge and Princeton; burr, northern pin, and bicolor white oak; red maples; river birch; crab apple; linden; basswood; the Kentucky coffee tree; black and Niobe weeping willow; hackberry; black walnut; white pine; white and Norway spruce; white and red cedar; Douglas fir, and Degroot’s spire arborvitae. The planting plan was reviewed at a public meeting in June 2007, and revisions were made based on comments and suggestions offered by area residents and park users, as well as the State Historic Preservation Office.
Back to top
Renovation Goals
In developing the Lake of the Isles Park renovation plan, the challenge has been to create sustainable as well as usable park space. Shoreline stabilization, wetland enhancement and restoration, path reconstruction, upland plant restoration, and the elevation of passive recreation areas are strategies that have been implemented to achieve the renovation goals, namely to balance aesthetics and the park’s historic integrity with the recreation needs of park users and the sustainability of a fragile environment.
Back to top
Maintaining the Park’s Historic Character
Because Lake of the Isles has been determined as eligible for listing in the National Register of Historic Places, improvements have been made with an eye to historic integrity. The lake’s tendency to revert to its former swampy self, however, makes this especially challenging. The many tons of fill brought in to raise the lake’s surrounding parkland above the 100-year flood level is one example of the lengths to which the MPRB has gone to satisfy both ecological and historic interests.
Back to top
Trees
In devising the tree planting plan, Sanders Wacker Bergly consultants Bill Bleckwenn and Larry Wacker studied photographs of the park during what has been determined to be the historic “period of significance”—1886 to1941—as well as bills of sale for plants acquired in the 1920s and ‘30s. They overlaid aerial photographs from the 1970s—a time when trees planted in the ‘20s and ‘30s had grown to maturity—to create a plan that replicates as closely as possible the clusters of trees and open spaces.
Over 400 trees have been lost since the 1970s to Dutch elm disease and, in the past decade, to severe storms, flooding and construction. While many of the lost elms were replaced with other specimens, of the nearly 400 trees that will be planted, many will be one of two disease resistant varieties of American elm.
Back to top
The Shoreline Challenge
The main area in which today’s Lake of the Isles differs from the historic “period of significance” is the shoreline. In the 1920s and ‘30s, lawn stretched to the water’s edge. Because of the difficult topography and ecological realities, it is not feasible to mow to the water’s edge to re-create this historic element today. The conversion of areas around the west bay and north arm into wetlands, which would have created the most ecologically sensible solution to Isles’ recurring flooding problems, was deemed to be too far off the historic mark. Maintaining a defined shoreline in this environment required a compromise: most of today’s shoreline has been stabilized with state-of-the-art technology that relies on native plants—grasses, flowers, and shrubs—ultimately taking root and holding the shoreline in place.
To offer park visitors the ability to reach the water’s edge, stone access points have been built around the lake. An alternative to negotiating shrubbery, these access points protect the shoreline plantings—and therefore the shoreline—from human traffic.
Back to top
Funding
The Lake of the Isles renovation to date has been funded through the Minnesota Environment and Natural Resource Trust Fund: Legislative Commission on Minnesota Resources, the Minnesota DNR Flood Mitigation Program, the Metropolitan Parks and Open Space Commission, East Isles Residents Association, Kenwood Isles Area Association, Lowry Hill East Neighborhood Association, Cedar Isles Dean Neighborhood Association and private donations.
Funds total $8,923,763. Any remaining funds are being used to complete island restoration, the upcoming spring tree planting, and bridge work.
Back to top
