By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
Get our mobile app
ROCKFORD — On a chalkboard-style sign near the back exit of Rocktown Adventures, a question is posed that predates the store itself by more than a decade.
“Whitewater in Rockford?”
The sign stems from talks Rocktown participated in during Chicago’s bid to host the summer Olympics in 2016. The thought was that if Chicago won the bid, Rockford could hold whitewater competitions on the Rock River, Rocktown’s general manager Kevin Versino said.
More news: United Way launches new initiative to address crisis-level low literacy rates
The 2016 Olympics went to Rio de Janeiro, and the push for whitewater here seemingly went with it.
But with participation in outdoor recreation surging after the coronavirus pandemic, the Rockford Area Convention & Visitors Bureau decided to revisit the topic in its latest survey.
“Outdoor recreation is growing, has been since the pandemic and continues in that regard,” said John Groh, president and CEO of the visitors bureau. “All past, current and new ideas should be on the table as we look at destination planning, including a whitewater park on the Rock River in downtown.”
The idea for a whitewater course on the Rock River south of the Fordam Dam was first floated by the River District Association in 2003 while Doug Scott was mayor, according to Rockford Register Star archives. Two decades later the conversation is still alive.
“An idea stays alive if people keep talking about it,”Groh said.
People have continued to talk about it at Rocktown Adventures, which opened in 2014 at 313 N. Madison St. in downtown.
Store manager Travis Turner says the question pops up from time to time from customers who wonder whatever happened to the idea.
Turner and Versino, Rocktown’s GM, both say a whitewater course could draw visitors to Rockford from outside the region.
“People will travel for whitewater,” Versino said. “It’s a destination. It’s a draw, and it’s part of a larger movement of recapitzalizing these assets to promote Rockford.”
Versino said towns such as Yorkville, roughly 75 miles southeast of here, draw large numbers of visitors to man-made whitewater kayak parks.
advertisement
The idea focuses on a nearly 7-acre site along the Rock River south of the Fordam Dam and north of the Morgan Street bridge, across the river from the soon-to-be revamped Davis Park.
The area was once home to a power plant that generated electricity for the city, and the site required environmental remediation work from ComEd. That work has been completed, and earlier this year ComEd entered a $1 lease with the city of Rockford that opened the land for public use and connected people at the UW Health Sports Factory to a pedestrian bridge that crosses the river.
“That land is open for public use for the first time,” Groh said. “Before, you were either hopping a fence or fishing on ComEd’s land sort of illegally, and now that space is open for public use and enjoyment.
“Maybe when people start seeing that space for themselves and viewing the river from that perspective below the dam, there might be ideas that percolate.”
More news: Business startup surge proves durable in Rockford three years after the pandemic
Versino sees the potential for a whitewater park to spur other outdoor recreation activities in the area.
“There’s other things you could put down there as well,” he said. “You could put up some climbing walls, a bouldering wall, or a ropes course. There’s other things that you could put near that whitewater park that could build off of that traffic and keep on drawing people into our downtown.”
Two decades after the idea was floated, it remains little more than an idea. There isn’t a proposed operator or funding to build the park. The visitors bureau kept the idea alive on its latest resident survey by asking participants to gauge the importance of building a whitewater rapids course on the river.
The survey continues through Sept. 30.
The bureau has asked similar questions in surveys in 2018 and 2015, and respondents have shown support for building the park, although not for funding it with taxpayer dollars.
“There’s not a concentrated or organized effort to move that idea forward,” Groh said. “It’s a good idea that has been in the community conversation in the past, and we want to see where the community is at on that topic now.”
Take the survey
You can take the Rockford Area Convention & Visitors Bureau and Belvidere Chamber of Commerce resident survey on tourism until Sept. 30 by going HERE.
This article is by Kevin Haas. Email him at khaas@rockrivercurrent.com or follow him on X at @KevinMHaas or Instagram @thekevinhaas and Threads @thekevinhaas