At 6 a.m. Thursday, bulldozer headlights appeared at the top of a small hill and in that moment, the 18-month fight to save ancient Bell Bowl Prairie ended.
Jessie Mermel was among a small group of people holding vigil overnight at the Rockford Airport, anticipating the imminent destruction of the prairie after courts declined to issue a last-minute stay on Wednesday. The prairie is being torn up to make way for a road that’s part of the airport’s midfield cargo expansion project.
Situated within the airport’s 3,000 acres, Bell Bowl had long been managed by the Natural Land Institute. In summer 2021, the institute was alerted to construction activity near the prairie, the first it was made aware of the airport’s expansion plan, a plan agencies including the Illinois Department of Natural Resources had signed off on without consulting Natural Land Institute.
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