District 150 wants new land to build new schools on?
Or how Glen Oak Park ceased to exist.
Ok, we all know District 150 wants to build new schools. It is true that many of the schools are old, tired, laden with lead and asbestos, and in sorry need to updating or replacing. Many of these buildings are architectually beautiful and significant. Rather than gut them and rennovate them, which would seem to be cheaper in my mind, District 150 wants to tear them down.
Or do they?
WTF is going on? In the Journal Star today we learn that District 150 wants to replace one of these tired buildings with a new one, in an entirely new location !!! New school on new land !!! WTF is that ! They can't build the new school where the old one stood? But it gets better...
This 'new' school is going to take up part of the ever shrinking Glen Oak Park. Let's see now, the zoo is going to eat up the baseball fields and much of the open space around them. The park district is going abandon its offices in the Glen Oak Pavilion to let the Junior League build a children's museum. Now the school district wants a chunk for a school. After all this is built where the f*** is the park? People need open spaces. Surrendering the open spaces is a bad idea.
Go to lakeview sometime. Take a look around. It's a park too. Isn't it? It is indeed, but it is all built over with museums, libraries, skating rinks, pools, girl scout stuff... etc. No big wide open spaces for kids to run around. No place to have a pick up game of flag football or soccer or baseball.
I remember the first memorial day we had in Peoria in 1995. We were driving around exploring. Glen Oak park was packed !!!! Packed with multitudes of families spending quality time. Barbequing, playing, relaxing. There was room for all. Parking was a bitch but there was no shortage of picnic tables and space. This is going to be destroyed by the zoo, by the Junior League, by District 150, by the Park District, and ultimately through the apathy of the public (ie us).
As a little side note. Many communities accross the midwest have parks similar to Glen Oak. They all had a pavilion. The pavilion was to be used much in the same fashion that the Gateway Building down along the river was intended to be used. They were to be a centerpiece for the park. A place to socialize. A play for community groups to gather for various needs. It was to be a public space. They were not to be administration offices or children's museums.
But I digress... why is the school district going to spend even more money to buy up new land so they can build a new school? This is just soooo wrong in soo many ways.
Ok, we all know District 150 wants to build new schools. It is true that many of the schools are old, tired, laden with lead and asbestos, and in sorry need to updating or replacing. Many of these buildings are architectually beautiful and significant. Rather than gut them and rennovate them, which would seem to be cheaper in my mind, District 150 wants to tear them down.
Or do they?
WTF is going on? In the Journal Star today we learn that District 150 wants to replace one of these tired buildings with a new one, in an entirely new location !!! New school on new land !!! WTF is that ! They can't build the new school where the old one stood? But it gets better...
This 'new' school is going to take up part of the ever shrinking Glen Oak Park. Let's see now, the zoo is going to eat up the baseball fields and much of the open space around them. The park district is going abandon its offices in the Glen Oak Pavilion to let the Junior League build a children's museum. Now the school district wants a chunk for a school. After all this is built where the f*** is the park? People need open spaces. Surrendering the open spaces is a bad idea.
Go to lakeview sometime. Take a look around. It's a park too. Isn't it? It is indeed, but it is all built over with museums, libraries, skating rinks, pools, girl scout stuff... etc. No big wide open spaces for kids to run around. No place to have a pick up game of flag football or soccer or baseball.
I remember the first memorial day we had in Peoria in 1995. We were driving around exploring. Glen Oak park was packed !!!! Packed with multitudes of families spending quality time. Barbequing, playing, relaxing. There was room for all. Parking was a bitch but there was no shortage of picnic tables and space. This is going to be destroyed by the zoo, by the Junior League, by District 150, by the Park District, and ultimately through the apathy of the public (ie us).
As a little side note. Many communities accross the midwest have parks similar to Glen Oak. They all had a pavilion. The pavilion was to be used much in the same fashion that the Gateway Building down along the river was intended to be used. They were to be a centerpiece for the park. A place to socialize. A play for community groups to gather for various needs. It was to be a public space. They were not to be administration offices or children's museums.
But I digress... why is the school district going to spend even more money to buy up new land so they can build a new school? This is just soooo wrong in soo many ways.
posted by Mahkno at 9:52 AM
2 Comments:
Why are they buying new land?
Because they have to. State law requires them to build new schools on 15 acres of land. Most of the old schools are on less than 5...Glen Oak school is only on 3 acres, so even if they were to raze and re-build, they'd have to buy land.
The 15 acres has been debunked. It is a recommendation, not a requirement.
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