a walk in the park

I heard an interesting presentation this morning from Megan Butler, the Programs and Events Coordinator for the city of Fort Wayne who deals with the new events that are and will be happening as the work along the rivers continues.  She spoke at a lunch for seniors and I was very impressed with her presentation.  I was surprised with the number of free events already happening along the rivers including bird watching, storytime on the bridge, a film series and hsitoric boat tours.  Two things that are in the works sound very interesting to me.  First they are building a "canopy walk" which is a raised walk that gets you up among the tree banches.  The other thing strikes even closer to home.  There are plans to revamp the Spy Run bridge over the St. Mary's River so it will be more like the MLK bridge with much wider side walks than the current bridge has.  I think this would be great.  I walk across the Spy Run bridge when I go to the Old Fort (one of my favorite one-mile walks for exercise) and sometimes the traffic speeding by seems dangerously close. Ms. Butler also satisfied my curiosity about another matter.  Our rivers look very brown and they always will.  It's because of the clay river beds.  She showed an interesting picture of a North Side High School Banner which an alum had laid out at the bottom of the river near the school and then photographed. It was amazing how clearly it showed through the river.  I'm very reassured with everything I heard today that one day we will have a lively, interesting series of attractions along our rivers.  I hope they work fast so I can enjoy it.