Project Updates
On December 6, 2022 The Irishtown Bend Park project received a $5M Challenge grant from The Jack, Joseph and Morton Mandel Foundation to create fundraising momentum around the Park's $45M capital campaign.
July, 2019 - The U.S. Departm
July, 2019 - The U.S. Department of Transportation awarded $9 million towards the stabilization of ITB through a grant from the department’s INFRA program, or Infrastructure For Rebuilding America, and will go to the Northeast Ohio Areawide Coordinating Agency (NOACA). The money will enable installation of ~2,600 feet of sheet steel bulkheads along the river’s edge. As of July, 2019, partners in the combined project have raised nearly $19 million in government and charitable grants, with commitments for another $4.5 million worth of donated land.
February, 2021 - Construction fencing has been erected around one of two parcels of land on W. 25th Street - the former CMHA multifamily housing complex known as "Big 8", as one of the first chapters of many toward the stabilization of the Irishtown Bend hillside. The next building targeted for demolition, the former Cuyahoga Metropolitan Housing Authority (CMHA) administrative building, will immediately follow. Demolition of the “Big 8” building may begin as early as Noon on Monday, February 8, 2021.
The fencing and imminent demolition signal the first visible steps towards the reality of Irishtown Bend for a coalition of nonprofit and government partners which aim to clear and stabilize the Cuyahoga River hillside and transform it into a 23-acre park. Demolition of these buildings will open access to the edge of the Cuyahoga River valley and potentially reveal dramatic views now obstructed.
Following a community-based effort to create a vision for a future greenspace, a coalition of nonprofit and governmental partners have been working together to both stabilize this portion of the Cuyahoga River shipping channel and use this opportunity to build a 23-acre riverfront park on this currently impenetrable land. Demolition of these buildings will open access to the potential of the Cuyahoga River valley and reveal dramatic views of the downtown skyline, which have been obstructed for decades.
