Milwaukee Audubon Voices
A sinuous dam within the Milwaukee River in Glendale’s Kletzsch Park forms a gentle waterfall. Fly-fishers often wade downstream from it. A bluff with ancient oak trees draws many visitors to three benches and a picnic table. Even on a brisk day last week, a steady parade of pedestrians walked the trail between the river’s west bank and the Milwaukee River Parkway.
This riverfront overlook might soon be erased and replaced.
Hundreds of citizens have signed petitions, written letters, and attended meetings in opposition to the proposed Milwaukee County Parks Kletzsch Park Dam Upgrade. According to the county website, “The Kletzsch Park dam project will include: A 350-foot-long, rock-filled fish passage that will let native fish move past the dam” — after they excavate and remove more than 10,000 cubic yards of the historic bluff and after a massive retaining wall is installed. This “upgrade” will place the “overlook in front of the waterfall” 70 to 100 feet back from the edge of the bluff where we now stand under the old trees to look at river and the serpentine falls.
