A large, open property at one of northern Michigan’s busiest intersections serves an important ecological purpose and likely won’t be modified in the near future.

The city of Traverse City owns a roughly 60-acre chunk of land at the southwest corner of the intersection of 14th Street/Silver Lake Road and Division. Tens of thousands of vehicles drive by this space (officially a park named Meijer's Silverbrook Acres) every day.  

Aside from open space, limited trees and a dense colony of stubborn and invasive shrubs like autumn olive and buckthorn, the property contains a large section of Kids Creek (a notable tributary of the Boardman River) along with smaller tributaries of Kids Creek itself.

This natural feature is key to the property’s ecological importance, and restoration of the degraded creek has been a major focus in recent years. The Watershed Center Grand Traverse Bay received about $750,000 in federal and state funding to complete a variety of work on the property to reduce stormwater, sediment and nutrient inputs into the creek.

Among other projects, work included installation of a wetland that intercepts stormwater runoff and a 30-foot riparian buffer loaded with native plants along the length of the creek. Such buffers serve to prevent massive amounts of sediment and pollutants from entering this waterway. 

“It was such a satisfying project to see all those trees and shrubs and grasses go in the ground – the sheer number of plantings that we had along 1,500 feet of the creek,” Sarah U’Ren, program director for the Watershed Center, tells The Ticker. “This is one of the most impacted streams in our watershed, and that’s why we want to help protect it and bring it back to what it once was.”

Visible from the road are hundreds of white tubes that contain balsam fir, tamarak, red maple, yellow birch, quaking aspen and more. These tubes protect trees in their early stages of development, and they also allow passersby to better imagine what the property might look like in a few decades, U'Ren says. 

“When you put a baby tree in the ground, there’s a lot of things that like to come nibble,” she says. “So each one of those things is a tree, and…it’s pretty cool to think that as those trees get bigger and bigger, you’ll see even more change.”

The city acquired the property from the state in 1977. Documents connected to the sale show that the initial plan was for the city to sell land on the western side (along Franke Road) to Goodwill, presumably for a store there. Sale terms also allowed the city to develop the property along Division itself, while maintaining a buffer along the creek.

None of that ever materialized. Meijer later acquired the land along Franke to extend its parking lot to the north, while the rest of the property remains undeveloped.

“As someone who grew up here, I’m very surprised and happy that it hasn’t been developed,” city parks Supervisor Matt Bright tells The Ticker. “As a kid I used to go in there and fish and walk around, and for it to stay that way is very nice.”

The low land around the creek is critical from a surface water management standpoint, Bright says.

“It’s very important for runoff,” he says. “If that intersection had been developed, there would be a lot of flooding or other issues.”

The property is under the purview of the city parks department, though it is not managed for public access. Even without easy public access, the property offers considerable public benefits, parks Superintendent Michelle Hunt tells The Ticker.

“It’s nice that when you come into Traverse City, whether you’re a local or a tourist, one of the first things you see is this nice natural area,” she says. “Do we have all the native species that we would like to see there? Nope. There's quite a bit of autumn olive and some other things. But for now, it’s serving a purpose for wildlife (and watershed protection)."

Click here for more information about restoration efforts on the property.