SILO Update

This past weekend officially marked the beginning of our spring-time adventure that is the SILOs. Sunday temps of 45 degrees and sunny weather afforded us a productive day of work. The team worked diligently all afternoon to clear brush on the east property line to make way for fence installations that will be done this week and shoveled 15 years of garbage out of the areas surrounding the silos. We managed to nearly fill a 40 cubic yard dumpster in 5 hours! Needless to say, the place is already looking better, and none too soon. In not too long, we’ll be seeing real progress towards climbing at the SILOs. Here’s a rundown of the highlights from the past few months.

Special Use Permit

 
This was the first major hurdle to overcome, but thanks to our engineer, Olsson Associates, who has been in back and forth battle with city planning the past few months, we were granted our special use permit Tuesday afternoon. With official approval from the City, we can now apply for our building permits to get the boulders and office space constructed. Obtaining the special use permit is assuredly the genesis of real progress towards climbing.

Check out more on the permit acquisition here (link, link).

Architect

Rick has hired Contrivium, and Omaha-based architecture firm, to design the climbing spaced and develop a master plan for the site. Eddy Santamaria is working on the drawings now and I hope to be able to display them in my next post. In preliminary discussions, we’ve determined it to be more efficient to use the silos as our building space, as opposed to constructing a separate pavilion. This will leave more room on the site for green space and future development, and will be more cost effective, as we’ll be using the existing structures.

Additionally, Eddy has been working on a master plan for the site. The first phase of this will obviously include the climbing facilities, indoor/outdoor roped climbing and bouldering. Also included in the first phases will be a neighborhood garden utilizing the green space on the site. Down the road, there are plans for a small outdoor amphitheater, the high ropes course, and more….

Emerging Terrain

 
I’m sure many of you have heard rumblings about a mural project to be displayed on our silos. Since last fall, Rick has been in contact with an NPO called Emerging Terrain to coordinate a temporary art exhibit themed around land use and agriculture. This will feature a multiple banners from as many as 16 artists that will be hung on the sides of the silos. This is a concept of what our silos could look like.

A Concept of the Murals provided By Emerging Terrain

They will be unveiled in October of this year with a dinner at the SILOs for 400 prepared by the Metro Community College Culinary School with all local ingredients. The plan is to have them up at our location for two months, then move them in two-month intervals to other silos in the Midwest. And in a charitable culmination, when the exhibition is complete, the banners will be taken down, cut, and donated for use as temporary emergency shelters and donated.

You can find updates on the progress of the exhibit at www.emergingterrain.org.

Energy Rescue

 
Perhaps one the most exciting developments in the past month is our newly formed relationship with a company called Energy Rescue. This company primarily is involved with helping underprivileged citizens in the Omaha area meet their energy needs by working with the public utilities to establish affordable payment plans, in lieu of shutting off their service. In addition to their philanthropic efforts, they are involved in everything green in relation to energy. This is where we come in. We are working with Tonya Ward, the energetic and driven president of the company, to connect with low-profile wind turbine and solar panel manufacturers. Our hope is that a high-profile project such as ours will provide an opportunity to showcase alternative energy in the Omaha area and open the possibilities for other businesses and residences. We are incredibly optimistic to see the fruits of this relationship.

One final note. We’ve started a Facebook page for the SILO project. I encourage you all to become a fan and follow the progress.

This winter has been on one hand frustrating and demoralizing, but on the hand, more uplifting that we could have hoped for. Through all of Rick’s visits to neighborhood meetings, connections he’s been making, and behind-the-scenes progress, we’ve paved the way for real progress this spring. And we’ve had nothing but support from local residents and officials which just gives us more motivation! All we need now is a lot of hard work and a little help from the weather gods and we’ll have a great climbing venue to rival any in the country.