MORELAND HILLS, Ohio — The nonprofit Western Reserve Land Conservancy has acquired a 28-acre former landfill in Cleveland’s Old Brooklyn neighborhood and plans to make it part of a growing green corridor that includes the Cleveland Metroparks Zoo, Brookside Reservation and the Ohio & Erie Canal Towpath Trail.
The Land Conservancy secured a Clean Ohio Conservation Fund grant to acquire the former Henninger Landfill and adjacent properties along Big Creek, just east of the zoo and West 25th Street.
Key link
The parcel could eventually become a key link between the zoo property and the Towpath Trail. Plans call for public use of the property, and project partners are working together to make the vision a reality.
The project protects 1,015 linear feet of Lower Big Creek, and improving its water quality will support the improvement and ultimate delisting of the Cuyahoga River as an Area of Concern.
The project is located within the Cuyahoga River Watershed, which drains a total of 812 square miles and flows through all or part of six counties.
Much of the lower Cuyahoga River watershed is an internationally designated Great Lakes Area of Concern, a designation for the worst polluted tributaries to the Great Lakes.
To delist the Cuyahoga River as an AOC, identifying and protecting natural areas to address the loss of fish and wildlife habitat within its watershed is necessary.
