Cleveland’s Puritas-Longmead neighborhood boasts one of the newer areas of Cleveland. It’s known as one of the few communities that hold a residential housing stock that dates after World War II.
The neighborhood expects three new schools by December 2008.
Neighborhood Gem
If it weren’t for Cleveland’s highway infrastructure, the Puritas-Longmead neighborhood would never have staked claim to the birds that call the area home along their migration path. The wetlands created by the runoff of the highways made a perfect environment for the Oatey Sanctuary, where West 140th Street hits Puritas Avenue.
“Oddly enough, it was highways that gave us this wetlands,” says Bryan Gillooly, executive director of the Bellaire-Puritas Development Corp. “Apparently [the highway runoff area] holds water and lets water naturally drain. And it turns out that it’s a nesting area for all types of rare birds— some endangered species and some migratory.”
City planners hope to create parking and a walkway so residents can observe the birds. “There are several species that come here and just rest on their way to doing what they’re doing,” says Gillooly. “So here we are with a bird sanctuary in the middle of the city.”
