EA Guide Claudia Fulton
Executive Arrangements is celebrating our 40th anniversary by showing off our 40 favorite places in Northeast Ohio. Guide Claudia Fulton brings us to the beauty, views, and habitat of Cleveland Lakefront Nature Preserve, a space that was not too long ago a dumping ground. This space is especially important to Claudia as she was integral in its establishment.
The area east of Gordon Park (right off the Shoreway near the Cultural Gardens) was a garbage dump for much of the twentieth century. Meanwhile, dredgings from the bottom of the much-polluted Cuyahoga River were being spread in Lake Erie and contaminating its shores. Following the Clean Water Act, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed that a dike be created off shore of the dump site to better hold the existing waste material as well as all dredging material. This area, named Dike 14, was used from 1979 until 1999. Since 1999 the area has been naturally revitalizing. In 2012 Dike 14 opened to the public as the Cleveland Lakefront Nature Preserve, an 88 acre park popular for bird watching with over 280 species. Claudia talks more about the importance of the park for bird species here.
