By Joshua Benton
Blade Staff Writer
Page 13
Standing on the newest section of Toledo’s Riverwalk, Mayor Carty Finkbeiner yesterday announced the latest stage of the downtown boardwalk, which he touts as one of the most important elements of making downtown an attractive place to live.
“People will look back years from now and say this was as critical to revitalizing downtown as COSI, or the LaSalle Apartments, or the Valentine Theatre, or the baseball stadium,” the mayor said.
Mr. Finkbeiner hopes to have a pedestrian walk ringing the down|town section of the Maumee River King, Jr., Bridge, International Park, Anthony Wayne Bridge, Owens Corning’s world headquarters, and the downtown riverfront tending to the Erie Street Market.
This summer, workers will complete a section of the riverwalk in International Park from the end of the current walkway, next to the boat basin, to near the volleyball courts. The city council allocated $350,000 this year for the work.
In the last year, the city has made three additions to the riverwalk: a boat dock on Swan Creek behind the market; a brick-paved stretch on the south side of the creek near Owens Corning, and a boardwalk under construction on the north side of the creek.