Flora Johnston Nature Park

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Flora Johnston Nature Park, also called the Flora Johnston Nature Preserve or North Shades Creek Greenway is a 37.12-acre public park along upper Shades Creek in Birmingham's Eastwood neighborhood. The park's sole amenity is a 1.49 hiking trail, accessed from a trail head and parking area at 305–311 Elder Street. The trail runs along the creek's south bank, below Scenic View Drive.

Retired educator and Eastwood Neighborhood Association president Flora Johnston spent years petitioning the city to protect the wooded slope and stream behind her home. She led neighbors in a successful campaign to stop a proposed townhouse development, and also raised funds through the neighborhood association to the purchase of the land. To that end she secured a resolution from the Birmingham Parks and Recreation Board to recommend the dedication in August 1990. The parcel was donated to the city and dedicated as a city park in 1993. It was named in her honor in June 1994.

In 1997 neighborhood officers in the Crestline Community recommended making a trail connection from the Flora Johnston Nature Park to the Irondale Furnace Trail in Mountain Brook. That proposal, described as being similar to Jemison Park's popular trail. met objections from some homeowners along the proposed route who expressed concern about, "what kind of people the trail would attract."

As part of a 2003 settlement agreement regarding storm drainage, the city had been dredging upper Shades Creek and clearing vegetation from its banks using herbicides and heavy equipment. In December 2015 the Alabama Department of Environmental Management (ADEM) issued a notice of violation of the Clean Water Act. The agency required the city to prepare and submit a "Construction Best Management Practices Plan" for future work on the stream. Volkert Engineering was contracted to prepare the plan, which was submitted and approved in September 2016. Around the same time Cahaba Riverkeeper documented excessive amounts of contaminated runoff emptying into Shades Creek near Elder Street and promoting bacterial growth. It was determined that the source of the pollutants was the GooGoo Express car wash at 7641 Crestwood Boulevard, which was fined by ADEM. The company subsequently connected its drains to the sanitary sewer system.

A rose garden was planted at the trailhead in memory of long-time Eastwood Neighborhood Association president Lela Jenkins.

Extension

The trail is a part of the Shades Creek Greenway in the Red Rock Ridge & Valley Trail System. Planners have again recommended connecting it with the Irondale Furnace Trail. A study conducted in 2023 by Dynamic Civil Solutions and Alta Planning & Design of Portland, Oregon for the Regional Planning Commission documented some of the requirements for such a connection, including the need to acquire parcels or easements from private owners and to install bridges over tributary streams. Opportunities for a neighborhood access point at the ends of Alpine Street or Redwood Street were examined and numerous examples of fence encroachments into public land were documented. The last trail linkage between the existing bridge on Groover Street to the end of Forest Glen Drive was not studied in detail, with an expectation that sidewalks on Shiloh Drive and Stone River Road would be utilized initially. The cost of the project was estimated at $2.4 million.

The Birmingham City Council approved a $239,000 payment to Freshwater Land Trust to advance the planning for that connection, for which $1 million of the city's American Rescue Plan Act funding would be applied.

References

External links

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