DGreport.com » Public Works

Hammer time

Mark Thoman — Sat, 20 Jun 2009 13:44:25 +0000

Last night right before the car show was scheduled to start a huge blow ripped through DG, knocking down large branches, knocking over trees and taking out power. Those 70 mph winds and rain turned skies from day to night across a wide swath of the Chicago area. Police in Bolingbrook reported a tornado may have touched down shortly before 4 p.m. in the Green Valley Forest Preserve, a funnel cloud was spotted near Geneva, and a third tornado had possibly appeared near 119th Street and Naperville Road.

DG PW crews are out in force over the weekend working on clearing damage away from buildings, roads and driveways. Most of the debris clean-up will probably happen during normal weekday work schedules.

We missed most of the rainfall. Chicago had a record rainfall yesterday and had to open the Wilmette locks to discharge overflow directly into the lake. ComEd said some 186,000 customers were without service as of late Friday afternoon. Most, about 108,000, were in the north suburbs. Another 36,000 were without power in the south suburbs, 30,000 in Chicago and another 12,000 in the west suburbs.

Public Works Open House

Mark Thoman — Sat, 09 May 2009 03:25:41 +0000

Public Works will hold an Open House Friday May 15 from 2pm to 7pm at the Public Works building, 5101 Walnut Avenue. Guided tours, equipment displays and demonstrations, giveways, and refreshments for all.

EAB Update

Mark Thoman — Thu, 07 May 2009 14:25:08 +0000

Two years ago the Village Forester Kerstin G. von der Heide gave a presentation about the Emerald Ash Borer and the certain doom bearing down on over 4,000 ash trees on village parkways. Back then the tiny pest had already killed off about 25 million ash trees in Michigan and Canada.

Treatments are available and getting more reasonable in price and application method. Here’s one treatment option from MSU (ground zero of the infestation) from 2007 for ash tree owners to read over. Purple ash trees are a bit hardier than green ash, and may have a slightly higher chance of survival with treatment.

The state EAB website is here.

Last month Burr Ridge’s Public Works Department finished up a report on treatment options and bid out treatment costs for their parkway trees. Here is the link to that report, pricing is on page 5. I would expect single tree pricing to be higher, but it gives you an idea.