By Kevin Haas
Rock River Current
Get our mobile app
ROCKFORD — A more than 80-year-old dam recognizable for its graffiti-covered concrete walls is slated to undergo the final phase of a multimillion-dollar rehabilitation project early next year.
Alpine Dam at Reuben Aldeen Park, 623 N. Alpine Road, was built in 1942 as part of President Franklin D. Roosevelt’s New Deal-era jobs programs to contain floodwaters along the northern branch of Keith Creek. However, the Army Corps of Engineers has told the city the dam no longer meets federal design standards and it has structural issues due to its age.
More news: New Rockford antique and oddities shop Scavenged Parts celebrates the weird and creepy
Now the city is preparing to move forward with the final improvements to the dam, culminating a process that started when the Army Corps of Engineers delivered its report in 2007 after major flooding in several areas of the city.
The City Council’s Finance and Personnel Committee voted Monday to award a $2.76 million contract to DPI Construction of Pecatonica to handle the work. The project is funded in part by $800,000 in state funds. Final approval of the contract is slated to happen at next week’s City Council meeting.
“Our contractor is looking to start as soon as possible this spring or late winter,” said Jeremy Mitchell, the city’s assistant stormwater manager. “Weather permitting, they would like to start doing the earth excavation portion of the project in February or March.”
An additional foot of concrete will be added to the graffiti-covered dam spillway, chute and stilling basin. Existing chute blocks will be reconstructed, a row of baffle blocks will be added and a new drainage system will be installed.
“So there will never be that cesspool looking nastiness at the bottom of the dam anymore. It should all drain right to Keith Creek,” Mitchell said.
Crews will also excavate thousands of cubic yards of dirt to install a new auxiliary earthen spillway between the existing dam and Alpine Road. That earthen dam will stand about seven feet higher and increase the capacity to handle severe floods.
Dams like this one are required to handle what’s referred to as the “probable maximum flood,” which refers to the maximum amount of water that could flow through the area before it breaches the dam.
“By us building this additional auxiliary earthen spillway we can handle 100% of that probable maximum flood and still keep the water from going over the very top of it,” Mitchell said. “You’ve probably heard the term 100-year storm. That recently changed. Rainfall intensity has gotten worse. Hundred-year storms when the dam was built are a lot different nowadays.”
More news: New day spa Juluxxe Beauty opens in downtown Rockford
A road with permeable high density polyethylene pavers will also be built for work crews to access the dam.
The dam’s concrete spillway has only been activated once in its 81-year history, Mitchell said. That happened in mid-July 1952, when about a dozen inches of rain fell in the area over a period of 26 hours.
“That’s the only time we’ve ever seen water go over that,” he said. “In 2018 I know we got a couple feet from the concrete spillway, but we never went over.”
A previous $2.3 million phase of the project started in 2020, when the city reinforced the spillway and modernized the equipment that controls the floodgate. That work changed the gate from a manual crank system to being run remotely by computer. The dam is also equipped with sensors to track water height and alert the city to high water levels.
Sledding and graffiti
For many Rockfordians, the dam was a childhood sledding hill and the site of a decades-long tradition of high school students graffiti painting the concrete spillways.
The graffiti painting started in 1954 when a group of seniors from West High School went to the park overnight and painted “Go West” in red letters. The tradition evolved into a sanctioned event with rules and permits, but the practice ended in 2020 as the city began to make improvements. However, graffiti artists have still covered the walls since the sanctioned practice ended three years ago.
More news: New restaurant Poke Green offers Hawaiian and Asian fusion in Rockford
Inspectors want the dam free of paint so they can see any potential cracks or structural issues.
“We will have to remove the graffiti again in order to put a foot of concrete on the spillway walls,” Mitchell said.
The Rockford Park District, which owns the park where the dam is located, posted a no sledding sign on the dam in 2019 due to a combination of flooding at the basin and safety concerns.
Sledding will continue to be prohibited after the latest round of repairs are done.
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