Smack in an Urban Setting, a Nature Preserve Grows: Former Dump at Times Beach is a Model of Transformation
By John F. Bonfatti, The Buffalo News, N.Y.
Jun. 12–Fifteen years ago, birdwatcher Roberta Vallone had little company as she traipsed through thigh-high weeds and brambles to indulge her pastime at Times Beach, just over the Buffalo River from downtown.
Now, a system of trails, overlooks and blinds has created a nature preserve that is getting more popular all the time, and not just with birders, she said.
“You always see people here now,” Vallone said.
Elected officials and environmentalists gathered Monday afternoon to officially dedicate the Times Beach Nature Preserve, a 53-acre tract that once served as a repository for dredged Lake Erie sediments.
After the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers stopped dumping at the site adjacent to the Coast Guard station, environmentalists and others pushed for the creation of the preserve.
The result is a wildlife oasis of wetlands and woodlands within eyesight of the Buffalo skyline.
“You’re standing here in the middle of an urban center, and you forget that’s exactly where you are,” said Mark Thomas, regional director of one of the funding sources for the project, the state Department of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation.
Erie County Executive Joel A. Giambra and Rep. Brian Higgins, D-Buffalo, both pointed to the preserve as one of the tangible signs that the long-underused waterfront is coming to life.
“This is a showcase of what can be done with regional cooperation,” Giambra said.
Giambra noted that the preserve and the new Steel Winds wind farm project at the former Bethlehem Steel site will bracket major development in the future.
“In between are numerous opportunities and great potential,” he said.
Higgins hinted that plans for some of that area will be announced shortly, including better auto access so Times Beach can be visited “without having to take a four- or five-mile detour around the waterfront.”
As it is now, visitors to the preserve coming over the Skyway from Buffalo and onto Fuhrmann Boulevard must head south, than turn around and go north on the boulevard before finding the preserve’s parking lot.
Pressed for details, Higgins would say only that the office of Gov. Eliot L. Spitzer is working on more detailed plans.
“We’re poised for several more major announcements over the next 60 days,” Higgins said.
Whatever happens, Times Beach will remain a sanctuary for more than 240 species of birds, a diversity that birdwatchers say is unmatched for miles.
Many of those species are migratory, raptors and waterfowl that use the preserve as a stopover on their spring trips north and their fall trips south.
But there are at least 50 species, mostly songbirds, that live within the preserve.
“It’s pretty ‘birdy,’ ” Vallone said. “You can hear them all singing, and you can see them all flitting around.”
jbonfatti@buffnews.com
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