Bloomington making efforts to restore rare brick streets

BLOOMINGTON, Ill. (AP) - Efforts are underway in Bloomington to preserve what's left of the central Illinois city's brick streets.

Public Works Director Jim Karch tells The (Bloomington) Pantagraph (http://bit.ly/2uwGCRV ) that Bloomington has about 3 ˆ½ miles of brick streets, down from an original 41 miles of brick streets. Brick streets make up about 1 percent of the city's 320 miles of streets. He says his staff is working on a new brick streets master plan. He says he'd like a decade-long plan that allots about $500,000 a year to brick street restoration.

Lea Cline is vice chairman of the Bloomington Historic Preservation Commission. She says any brick street "that exists now is such a tiny gem." She doesn't want higher priority for brick streets in historical districts. However other historic preservation commissioners disagree.

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Information from: The Pantagraph, http://www.pantagraph.com