Wetlands and small streams are the first line of defense for communities facing hurricanes and severe storms. Coastal wetlands physically slow down storms by impeding their path to land and minimizing their full force, while freshwater wetlands and headwater streams inland act as sponges, absorbing significant amounts of rainwater and runoff before flooding can occur.

A new study published in August by Scientific Reports looks at the value of wetlands in protecting property. According to the study, coastal wetlands thwarted $625 million worth of property damage during Hurricane Sandy in 2012. While the total savings represent just 1 percent of Sandy’s overall cost ($50 billion), wetlands and streams still helped spare hundreds of homes and thousands of miles of roads from more damage.

Over the past month we’ve watched Hurricanes Harvey and Irma devastate Texas and Florida with record flooding. Unfortunately, this is consistent with the impacts expected from climate change and will be the new normal that we must adapt to. But over the past two centuries, the U.S. has lost over half of its wetlands. Texas alone has lost 52 percent, or 8.4 million acres, of its wetlands from 1780 to 1980.

We need to be doing more to safeguard these vital wetlands. Unfortunately, Environmental Protection Agency Administrator Scott Pruitt and the Trump Administration are pushing a roll back of the Clean Water Rule. The streams and wetlands that this rule protects are the same streams and wetlands that protect lives and property during flooding events. Wetlands span some 110 million acres across the U.S., while small streams that dry up from time to time but come back to life and soak up flood waters during rain events make up more than 60% of the stream miles in the U.S.

Losing the protections for these small streams and wetlands is not worth the risk when it comes to not only flood protection, but also drinking water and the economy – especially with the uncertainty we face with a changing climate.

We have until September 27^th to tell the Environmental Protection Agency that we cannot throw out protections for streams and wetlands and we must uphold the Clean Water Rule.

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When traveling in Europe this summer, I was struck by how European rivers are central to their lives and history – just like on this side of the Atlantic.

Our first stop was in Paris, where the Seine is a central theme. From a historical perspective, the river was named for Sequana, Goddess of the River, and received the ashes of Joan of Arc. From an artistic angle, the river has been the location of Seurat’s “Sunday Afternoon”, Javert’s death in Victor Hugo’s Les Miserables, Jake Barnes’ late night strolls in Hemingway’s The Sun Also Rises, and more recently, La La Land’s “Fools Who Dream”. And it’s hard to walk near it without being drawn to the artists offering their souvenir paintings for us tourists to take home.

Our next city was Munich, where in the 12^th century Henry the Lion burned a competitor’s bridge as a way to expand both his wealth and the city of Munich. The Old Town sits close to the River Isar, with the prominent Isartor (Gate to the Isar) still looming large. It is along the river in the English Garden and Maximilian Park where the locals enjoy their sunshine and local offerings (such as at the Chinese Tower Beer Garden). And in the English Garden, you can see locals surfing 24×7, on a channel pulled off of the Isar (click here for an amazing video).

In Italy, Florence’s location was decided by the narrow spot in the River Arno, which later became the birth of the Renaissance. And our stop in Rome was perhaps the most impressive. Here, Rome’s location was defined by an important river crossing for trade, and the river became even more important after the Roman aqueducts were destroyed during the Dark Ages, motivating the Roman Catholic Church to move the city’s center closer to the Tiber River as its main water supply. The Roman love of rivers can best be seen in the Piazza Navona where you can see Bernini’s Fountain of the Four Rivers (1651) (see photo).

There’s an old adage: “If you want a new idea, read an old book”, which completely applies to understanding the importance rivers have played in these European cities, and ones like them here and across the globe. We have always needed our flowing water, and still do.

This guest blog by Trout Unlimited is a part of our America’s Most Endangered Rivers® series on the Middle Fork Flathead River.

On August 13^th, thirty cars of a Montana Rail Link train derailed near Noxon, Montana, sending several thousand tons of coal into and near the Clark Fork River. In 2011, it was 19 cars of a Burlington Northern Santa Fe train carrying 200 tons of frozen chickens and turkeys that spilled into the Middle Fork of the Flathead River near Essex, Montana. Derailments are a common problem across Montana, and the steep, unstable terrain and winding tracks of the western part of the state see more than their share.

Deep in the Bob Marshall Wilderness two crystal clear streams, Strawberry Creek and Bowl Creek, come together to form the headwaters of the spectacular Middle Fork of the Flathead River. The river flows northwest toward Glacier National Park, Highway 2 and the Burlington Northern Santa Fe railroad where it forms the southwestern boundary of the park. This 50-mile wilderness section of the river is available only to the most seasoned and adventurous rafters and fishermen. Once the river reaches Highway 2 downstream of Bear Creek, it becomes generally available to recreational rafters, floaters, kayakers, and fishermen providing some of the most breathtaking whitewater rafting in the nation and impressive angling for Montana’s native fish.

Throughout its nearly 100-mile course, the Middle Fork is protected by Wilderness, National Park, National Forest, and undeveloped state and private lands. These protections yield some of the cleanest and clearest waters found anywhere in the West. The clean, clear, cold, and connected waters of the Middle Fork provide home waters, and much of the last remaining habitat for dwindling populations of federally threatened native bull trout and native westslope trout that have managed to hang on in this difficult environment for thousands of years. This resource attracts anglers, floaters, and photographers from around the country as well as many international visitors.

In the 1950s, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed developing a massive dam on the upper stretch of the Middle Fork at Spruce Park. The dam would have drowned much of the river all the way to Schaefer Meadows in the Bob Marshall Wilderness. The proposal was ultimately defeated due to a concerted effort on the part of Montana and National conservation groups as well as two famous Montana grizzly bear biologists, Frank and John Craighead. In response to this and other threats, 16 different bills proposing river protections were introduced in Congress. On October 2, 1968, the Wild and Scenic Rivers Act was finally signed into law by President Lyndon Johnson. The act stated, in part:

 “It is hereby declared to be the policy of the United States that certain selected rivers of the Nation which, with their immediate environments, possess outstandingly remarkable scenic, recreational, geologic, fish and wildlife, historic, cultural, or other similar values, shall be preserved in free-flowing condition, and that they and their immediate environments shall be protected for the benefit and enjoyment of present and future generations.”

In 1976, 150 miles of the North, South, and Middle forks of the Flathead River were protected under the act, including all of the Middle Fork to its confluence with the South Fork near Hungry Horse, Montana.

Today, the Middle Fork is again under threat from development of a different sort. Millions of gallons of incendiary crude oil from the Bakken oil fields of North Dakota pass down the Flathead River corridor every day on its way to West Coast ports for export to Asia. The Burlington-Northern-Santa Fe tracks travel through the steep, unstable John Stevens canyon. Most of the oil continues to be transported in aging DOT-211 rail cars that were never intended to haul hazardous, or explosive cargo.

In a 2016 Risk Assessment, the Montana Public Service Commission (PSC) noted, “In 2015, an average of four shipments of Bakken crude oil transited through Montana each day. A new crude oil transfer facility in North Dakota was expected to increase shipments across Montana by five per week, and at full capacity the new facility could increase shipments by up to 40 trains per week.”

Fortunately, due to a recent plunge in oil prices, this prediction has, thus far, failed to be fulfilled, but we are seeing about 18 100-car trains on this corridor weekly. The PSC also reported that a total of 339 train accidents, excluding highway-rail collisions, occurred in Montana from 2006-2015. Further, “From 2006-2015, 2,035 train cars carrying hazmat materials in or across Montana were involved in accidents, of which 241 were damaged or derailed in five accidents.”

The federal government predicts that trains hauling crude oil or ethanol will derail an average of 10 times per year over the next two decades, causing more than $4 billion in damage and possibly killing hundreds of people if an accident happens in a densely populated part of the U.S.

Any derailment and oil spill on the Middle Fork of the Flathead is simply unacceptable. There would really be no effective way to stop a spill into the river once it occurs, especially if it happened during winter or under high flow conditions. Oil spill containment booms would be completely ineffective in the wild whitewater sections or under ice. They might get some of the viscous mess off the water surface, but there is no way to stop the volatile and soluble compounds, like benzene and toluene, from moving into the downstream aquifer where it would take many years to percolate through and would drastically impact the local economy and health. The effect on the aquatic resources of the Flathead River system would be devastating, both to the environment and to the local economy dependent on that resource.

Responders retrieved only about 2 percent of the oil from the 2011 Yellowstone River pipeline spill under much better conditions. These risks mostly ignore the very real hazards of explosion and fire that have occurred recently in Mosier, Oregon, Culbertson, Montana and the derailment in Lac-Megantic, Quebec, which killed 47 people.

For these reasons and many more, Montana Trout Unlimited and the Flathead Valley Chapter are asking that the Federal Railroad Administration, in conjunction with Burlington Northern Santa Fe Railroad develop a scientifically defensible and public derailment and safety plan for the Middle Fork Flathead River corridor. This irreplaceable resource is much too precious to be sacrificed needlessly on the altar of corporate profit.

Please join us in urging the Federal Railroad Administration to protect the Middle Fork Flathead by developing a safety agreement with Burlington Northern Santa Fe that helps prevent train derailments.

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Author:  David Brooks and Larry Timchak

David Brooks is the Executive Director of Montana Trout Unlimited and Larry Timchak is the President of Flathead Valley Trout Unlimited. Montana Trout Unlimited is comprised of 13 chapters, including Flathead Valley, representing approximately 3,900 members.

This is a guest post by David Schmitt.

Mill Creek was crucial to the development of Cincinnati, Ohio. In the city’s earliest days, it drew settlers looking for rich, fertile farmland, and water power. Mill Creek’s clear, clean water and thick riparian forests provided food, water, and timber. Its broad, flat floodplain was a perfect transportation corridor where industry grew and ultimately built Cincinnati into an industrial powerhouse, “The Queen City of the West”. Unfortunately, over time, that industrial development caused tremendous harm from direct disposal of contaminants, combined sewer overflows, and flooding caused by stormwater flowing over impervious surfaces. The Army Corps of Engineers attempted to address the flooding by channelizing large stretches of the Lower Mill Creek. This not only exacerbated some of the problems, but also cut off public access to the river.

In 1996, American Rivers included Mill Creek on its list of America’s Most Endangered Rivers. The 1996 listing detailed the host of perils faced by the stream, including three Superfund sites on its banks, 31 other hazardous waste sites, and 158 Combined Sewer Overflow (CSO) and Sanitary Sewer Overflow (SSO) outflows. At that time, 24.7 of the 27 river miles violated primary contact standards for fecal coliform and E. coli. In the lower 17 miles, the standards were violated in every single sampling site and the Ohio Environmental Protection Agency (OEPA) recommended that there be no public contact with Mill Creek waters.

By 1997, the trend was actually worse. Two new Superfund sites had been identified, the Army Corps of Engineers was conducting a study to justify walking away from the half-finished flood control project, the OEPA proposed weakening the beneficial use designations in some stream segments, and large scale development was being considered in the northern headwater sections of the stream.

This lead American Rivers to name Mill Creek among America’s Most Endangered Rivers of 1997, calling it “one of the most severely polluted and physically degraded urban streams in the United States” and the most endangered urban river in the country.

Two local non-profits, Groundwork Cincinnati-Mill Creek (“Groundwork”)  and the Mill Creek Watershed Council of Communities (‘the Watershed Council”) were formed shortly prior to the American Rivers listings and began the decades-long work of restoring the stream. The listings by American Rivers galvanized greater attention from community leaders, the public, and funding sources.

These two groups have worked tirelessly on projects benefitting both the Mill Creek itself and the surrounding communities. One of the most important steps was reminding community leaders and the public that the stream was even there. The channelization of the Mill Creek removed public access in many areas. Thick, often invasive, vegetation along its steep banks effectively screened it from sight in many others. In a long series of “urban stream adventures” state and federal legislators, mayors, county commissioners,  agency heads, reporters, university professors, students of all ages, streamside property owners, sewer district directors, public works directors, environmental regulators, stream restoration consultants, fishing enthusiasts, and attorneys were taken along the stream by canoe to view it firsthand.

With the help of many partners and volunteers, the two groups have completed a huge number of stream improvement projects including hike and bike trails, riparian plantings, wetland construction, dump removal, stream daylighting projects, bank reconstruction, instream habitat improvements, low head dam removal, and best management practices to control flood pulse waters. These include nine bankfull wetlands in the upper Mill Creek to hold flood pulse waters and allow sediment reduction. Throughout the watershed, smaller projects such as rain gardens, green infrastructure, and some larger parking lot runoff reduction projects are having a cumulative impact. The groups also have an extensive education program reaching over 1000 school children per year and providing job training and summer work opportunities.

In these region-wide efforts, the Watershed Council and Groundwork have received tremendous cooperation and collaboration from the 36 separate municipalities that call the watershed home. Increased enforcement by Ohio EPA, a federal Consent Decree ordering CSO and SSO remediation, leadership by the county-wide Metropolitan Sewer District, and popularization of these initiatives by the Watershed Council and Groundwork have wrought amazing changes throughout the watershed.

Water quality has improved dramatically as CSO and SSO outflows have been eliminated, direct disposal of pollutants have been outlawed, and remediation of stream side hazardous waste sites has been accomplished. Indeed, the most recent comprehensive water quality surveys of the Greater Cincinnati area shows that the Mill Creek’s water quality now rivals that of the Little Miami River, which is a state and national Wild and Scenic River.

With the improvement in water quality and the replacement of 9 low head dams with constructed riffles has come a tremendous rebound in fish, macroinvertebrate, and other species. The diversity of fish and macroinvertebrate species in the stream have more than doubled over the last twenty years and now meet Ohio’s standards for Warm Water Habitat at most sampling points. Herons, ducks, beaver and many other long-missing species of birds and mammals have returned to its shores.

So has another species that has rarely been seen along its banks in recent years – people! Because of the efforts of Groundwork, the Watershed Council, and many partner groups and agencies, it is now possible to hike and bike on the banks of the stream, as well as to canoe and fish in the stream itself.

A large number of new stream and community improvement projects are on the verge of launching and I believe that within the next decade, the Mill Creek will complete its renaissance and become a magnet to local residents as well as tourists.

While the potential is enormous, continued effort and vigilance are required. Challenges remain in the form of stormwater runoff, effluent from Combined Sewer Overflows and Sanitary Sewer overflows, the channelization of large portions of the stream, and the socio-economic struggles of many of the communities in which we work. In an effort to magnify the impact of their work, the Watershed Council and Groundwork are discussing even greater collaboration and the potential for a merger of the two groups.

If the last 20 years are any indication, the future of the Mill Creek looks bright.

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Author: David Schmitt

David Schmitt is the Executive Director of Groundwork Cincinnati-Mill Creek and the Mill Creek Watershed Council of Communities, as well as a Board member of American Rivers.

Two weeks ago, Hurricane Harvey devastated Texas with record flooding. Now, storm surge and rains from Hurricane Irma are ravaging communities across the Southeast.

We may not know the full impact for days. But we do know the damage will be severe and lives will be forever changed.

Irma makes 2017 the third year in a row that the lives of people in the Carolinas have been turned upside down by hurricanes. More than 75 dams failed in the Carolinas as a result of the 2015 and 2016 storms, and record flood levels were exceeded at many creeks and rivers.

Unfortunately, this is consistent with the impacts expected from climate change and will be the new normal that we must adapt to. With increasing temperatures we get more evaporation adding more moisture to the atmosphere. Catastrophic weather events result when increases in temperature and moisture seek to reach equilibrium.

After recovery from Irma we need to reassess how we can reduce the threats from flooding to keep people safe from future storms. We need to look for opportunities to give rivers more room to accommodate floodwaters, keeping people out of harm’s way. We’ll need to improve the safety of high-hazard dams, and reform the National Flood Insurance Program to reduce flood risks.

There is a lot of work to do. But right now, American Rivers encourages our supporters to help with the relief and recovery efforts. Our neighbors need help. We are grateful to all of the volunteers and first responders. Learn how you can help the victims of Hurricane Irma here.

Guest post by Nelson Brooke is a part of our America’s Most Endangered Rivers® series spotlighting the Mobile Bay Basin.

The Black Warrior River gets its name from Chief Tushkalusa, and so does the City of Tuscaloosa, situated on the river’s banks. In Choctaw, tushka means warrior and lusa means black. The Black Warrior watershed is contained entirely within Alabama, drains 6,276 square miles and parts of 17 counties, and measures roughly 300 miles from top to bottom. Black Warrior Riverkeeper has worked tirelessly since 2001 to protect this river from polluters on behalf of all who use it and call it home.  

Alabama’s 14 major watersheds, including the Mobile River basin, flow through the perfect blend of geological variation to provide ideal habitats for aquatic critters. Alabama’s 132,000 miles of rivers and streams are home to more aquatic biodiversity than any other state. The Black Warrior River watershed contains over 16,000 miles of streams and is home to 127 fish species, 36 mussel species, 33 crayfish species, 27 snail species, 15 turtle species and over one million humans.

The river’s headwater tributaries – Sipsey Fork, Mulberry Fork, and Locust Fork – begin within the rocky Cumberland Plateau. These rivers are popular recreation destinations for swimming, fishing, canoeing and kayaking.

 

The Mulberry Fork and the Locust Fork merge west of Birmingham to form the Black Warrior River, which flows southwest through the tail end of the Appalachian Mountains.

Near Tuscaloosa, the river starts flowing through the sandy East Gulf Coastal Plain. Here, the river’s vibrant floodplain, which floods thousands of acres of bald cypress and water tupelo wetlands, begins flowing through the Alluvial-Deltaic Plain within the Fall Line Hills and Alabama’s Black Prairie.

The river’s lower reaches cut through late Cretaceous Period deposits from 66 to 85 million years ago, exposing white chalk bluffs that are filled with interesting fossils of open-marine animals from the time when dinosaurs still roamed and roughly half of Alabama was covered with sea water.

At Demopolis, Alabama, the Black Warrior River flows into the Tombigbee River, which joins with the Alabama River to form the Mobile River, just North of Mobile Bay.

Act now to tell Governor Kay Ivey to pass strong protections for the flow of water necessary to sustain and protect the amazing biodiversity of the Black Warrior River, the Mobile Bay Basin and the people who rely on this system.

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Author: Nelson Brooke

Nelson Brooke is the staff Riverkeeper at Black Warrior Riverkeeper, a citizen-based nonprofit clean water advocacy organization dedicated to protecting the Black Warrior River and its tributaries by holding polluters accountable.

Guest post by Steve Jones is a part of our America’s Most Endangered Rivers® series spotlighting the Green-Toutle River.

Rivers are the arteries that deliver life to an ecosystem. They transport the fresh water of the highlands to the plains and oceans. They provide rich stream banks that harbor plants and insects that sustain flocks of ducks and geese and even larger populations of fish. And they provide the clean water for healthy and prosperous cities.

All those things are at stake on Washington’s Green River in Skamania and Cowlitz counties that is threatened by exploratory drilling for copper and gold.

Some people ask what harm could come from just finding out what minerals are there. The answer is plenty of harm, especially to endangered steelhead and salmon that spawn in the Green and downstream in the Toutle and Cowlitz rivers that are part of the ecosystem.

The mountainside where the proposed drilling would occur drains steeply down to the Green and could quickly carry effluent from bore holes into the river. Drilling may also fracture the mountainside and allow increased copper and other metals to leach into the groundwater that would eventually flow to the Green as well. Copper is the metal miners seek most and copper also is a particular threat to steelhead and salmon. Even brief spikes in the copper content of surface water interferes with the ability of steelhead and salmon to find habitat and spawn successfully.

The project is an even bigger threat on the Green, which has been designated a “Wild Stock Gene Bank” for winter and summer steelhead. The habitat needs to be functioning properly for a successful gene bank, and test drilling alone is likely to increase concentrations of dissolved copper entering the Green, let alone the impact of an open pit mine.

To protect the water as well as the plants, insects, fish, wildlife and communities downstream, we must stop this drilling.

Ask the Forest Service and Bureau of Land Management to protect this special place by denying the permit for this project and preventing future mining in the Green River Valley.

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Author: Steve Jones

Steve Jones is a member of Clark-Skamania Flyfishers. This group is dedicated to the preservation of wild fish stocks and the natural resources that sustain them. They are further committed to the promotion of flyfishing as a method of angling and, through it, an understanding of and appreciation for the diversity of nature.

My first experience with the Grand Canyon wasn’t in the arid west, standing almost a mile above the Colorado River staring into the enormous abyss; instead it was in an elementary school classroom in Chicago, Illinois. I gawked; eyes wide open at photos of this magical place, perplexed about how something so large and vast could exist. Like many Americans and people around the globe, even without standing at the rims edge, the grandeur of this important place is transmitted through photos, stories, and short films, inspiring us to protect and preserve one of America’s most important and iconic landscapes.

Almost two decades after seeing those photos I made it to the Grand Canyon for the first time. Instead of looking in from above, I gazed up from below, traveling through geologic time as we pushed off from Lee’s Ferry on my first river trip through the Canyon. After that adventure, I traveled back to the South Rim and observed the depth of the Canyon from above. The same feelings of majesty and awe I had as a small child washed over me, solidifying my determination to protect this place.

The Grand Canyon is one of our greatest symbols of the values of wild nature. The canyon represents more than 1.7 billion years of geologic time and is home to wildlife from the bighorn sheep to the endangered humpback chub. Dozens of creeks, springs, and tributaries connect with the Colorado River in the Grand Canyon, including the Little Colorado, Kanab Creek, Havasu Creek, and Bright Angel Creek.

However, the Grand Canyon is under threat. The opportunity to make whopping piles of money has attracted developers who wish to profit from the canyon’s grandeur, rather than admire it as the icon that it is. Threats to the canyon’s seeps, springs, and wildlife include legacy uranium mining claims, the substantial expansion of Tusayan a high desert village, increased air traffic at the lower end of the canyon, and the potential for a gondola shuttling nearly 10,000 people from the rim down to the confluence of the Colorado and Little Colorado Rivers. These threats against the canyon are hard to believe – it’s a National Park and a space so surreal that it must be protected. While National Park status does protect it in many ways, substantial risks still exist to the cultural and biological relevance of the confluence, to each of the canyon’s towering rims, to the skies above, and the ancient groundwater below the very surface of the earth.

Listen to Episode 4: Beauty and Risk in the Grand Canyon of We Are Rivers today and take action! Speak up to help protect the Grand Canyon today against these and future threats to one of our most important natural treasures.

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This past winter, California received record precipitation following five long years of drought. Central Valley rivers, especially the San Joaquin, saw water levels not seen in nearly a decade, putting a deteriorating flood control system to the test. Luckily, there were no catastrophic levee failures, but there were several smaller breaches and plenty of erosion throughout the system, including along several tributaries. It was also a chance to see how new flood management approaches would perform under persistent flood conditions.

Over the last decade, American Rivers and many other conservation nonprofits have been working together with state agencies, levee districts, and farmers to reshape the flood management paradigm in America’s bread basket – California’s Central Valley. “Multi-Benefit Flood Management,” as it is being called, relies on using nature-based solutions such as restoring and reconnecting floodplains to reduce flood risk while also providing additional benefits like habitat for endangered fish and wildlife, recreational opportunities, and groundwater recharge.

This approach is not really new though – California’s system of flood bypasses are an example of one type of multi-benefit flood management. The Yolo Bypass takes diverted flood water from the Sacramento River and spreads it out over 60,000 acres of floodplain and farm land to the West of Sacramento. This protects the city and its inhabitants and also provides critical floodplain habitat for threatened fish and wildlife. And in years that it doesn’t flood, its rich soils are farmed, much of it in rice production. Reconnecting and restoring floodplains that are directly connected to rivers (unlike flood bypasses), like American River’s project at Great Valley Grasslands State Park along the San Joaquin River, are another way to achieve multiple benefits while reducing flood risk.

American Rivers, funded by the Wildlife Conservation Society’s Climate Adaptation Fund, is working to help the California Department of Water Resources (DWR) improve and expand the Yolo Bypass to provide more frequent inundation of this critical floodplain habitat while reducing flood risk for Sacramento and other downstream communities. As part of this grant, American Rivers is also conducting an outreach campaign to help promote multi-benefit flood management and floodplain restoration throughout the Central Valley. We realized that high quality compelling imagery of completed projects, projects in planning stages, and floodplains in action were missing from our campaign. So we tasked ourselves with creating an image archive that could be used indefinitely by us and our partners for advocacy and outreach for years to come.

In order to document conditions along the San Joaquin River following an epic winter and collect stock imagery of the San Joaquin River for the image archive, American Rivers teamed up with LightHawk, a nonprofit that accelerates conservation through the powerful perspective of flight. Pilots volunteer their planes and time to fly missions that create new imagery, collect data, or inform the public about some of our environment’s most pressing issues. This work could not have been done without LightHawk and their volunteer pilots, who fill a critical gap that is often hard to fund.

Back in June, I met up with Bill Rush, one of LightHawk’s dedicated volunteer pilots, for a flight along the San Joaquin River. Bill lives in the Santa Cruz mountains and volunteers for LightHawk, Flying Doctors, and Baja Communidad. As a photographer, I knew I couldn’t pass up this opportunity even though I have a fear of flying. During the 2-hour flight, we followed the river from Stockton to Mendota and back up again. Luckily, the pilot’s many years of experience, combined with the fact that I was intently focused on what was 2,000 feet below me, resulted in a smooth and productive flight.

Though it was June, the river was still relatively high (around 5,000 cubic feet per second) – high enough to see a few activated floodplains, but low enough to see impacts from the high flows that were endured for many months. Smaller levee breaches were clear in some areas (notice the beautiful sand patterns on farm fields in some of the photos), and other areas were still green and vibrant even though it was nearing mid-summer. I was also able to document several completed floodplain restoration projects and ones in planning stages that are being led by American Rivers and its partners. Overall, the flight provided invaluable imagery and data on the San Joaquin River after one of the wettest winters in recent years.

Given projected impacts to rivers due to climate change – increased frequency of wetter winters and drier summers – the imperative for more resilient approaches to water and flood management are more important than ever. By working with nature, instead of against it, we can improve the resiliency of California’s water infrastructure to more extreme floods and droughts.

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The enormous human tragedy unfolding in Texas, as a result of Hurricane Harvey, is a reminder that communities all over the United State are vulnerable to catastrophe when extreme weather events hit. As the nation rallies to help the people of Houston and the Gulf Coast recover, we should also prepare in our own homes and communities to make sure that we are ready for the next big storm.

Hurricanes and extreme floods are natural phenomena, but they can become human tragedies and economic disasters when we fail to prepare. Fortunately, we have new experience demonstrating how innovative flood management can gives us more tools to meet this challenge.

In California, American Rivers has been working with the state of California to develop a new flood plan for the Central Valley. In August, the Central Valley Flood Protection Board adopted that new plan, which will help protect more than a million people from devastating floods. Additionally, beyond providing for critical public safety, it will help restore the region’s rivers, fish and wildlife and groundwater supplies. By creating new parks and trails, it will also enrich the lives of Californians. More on that plan, below.

Major floods are becoming more common

The first step in preparing for extreme floods is confronting the risk. That risk is easy to overlook. After all, the odds of an extreme storm might be less than one percent in a single year. Your community could go many decades without seeing one. But, eventually, as in the case of the Gulf Coast today, an extreme storm will arrive. In addition, climate change is increasing the flood risk communities face. Confronting floods is one of the keys to making sure that our communities and natural resources will be resilient as our climate warms.

California and the Gulf Coast are both uniquely vulnerable to extreme precipitation events. Although the 50 inches Harvey dumped this week is setting a national record for totals over a single week, California has even more frequent high precipitation totals over three day periods. The following map from a scientific article about atmospheric rivers in the journal “Water” shows how California and the Gulf Coast both stand out when it comes to extreme precipitation.

Atmospheric rivers are jets containing staggering quantities of moisture from the tropics that periodically drench California and account for most of our floods and water supply. The great flood of 1862, which destroyed 1/3 of the taxable property in California, was almost certainly caused by an atmospheric river. A few years ago, the USGS attempted to simulate what might happen if we were struck with a similar ARk storm (Atmospheric River 1,000 year event) today and concluded that the resulting flood would displace 1.5 million people and cause flood damages totaling a whopping $725 billion.

If you are thinking that a 1,000 year event is too improbable to worry about, think again. There is evidence of six storms in the geologic record over the last 1,800 years that are larger then the flood of 1862. We are overdue. In addition, climate change could increases the risk we face, if more of the precipitation falls as rain rather than snow at the higher elevations of the Sierra Nevada.

For a quick read about the flood of 1862, ARk storms and the new Central Valley Flood Management Plan, check out the recent story and editorial in the Sacramento Bee.

Flood protection solutions in California

The scale of the risk is daunting. Fortunately, the new flood plan provides a road map to prepare for future floods in California’s Central Valley, which earlier settlers described as an Inland Sea. Giving rivers more room is the best way to keep communities safe from floods, and giving rivers more room provides multiple-benefits like clean water, parks and open space, groundwater recharge, and fish and wildlife habitat.

California’s new plan calls for expanding floodways and creating a new flood bypass at Paradise Cut on the Lower San Joaquin River to protect the rapidly urbanizing areas of Stockton, Lathrop, and Manteca. This new bypass will lower peak flood stage along 30 miles of river with a peak stage reduction of 2.5 feet at the I-5 Bridge, where thousands of new homes have recently been built. American Rivers led the design process and is leading the way to acquire the flood easements from private landowners that will be necessary to build the bypass. We have already obtained $4 million from the California Delta Conservancy and the California Department of Fish and Wildlife to buy flood and conservation easements for the new bypass. We are also helping the California Department of Water Resources expand the Yolo Bypass to better protect Sacramento. That expansion will aid the recovery of salmon runs on the most important salmon migratory corridor on the West Coast south of the Columbia River.

Multi-benefit flood management

The new flood plan calls for prioritizing multi-benefit flood management projects that are designed to reduce flood risk and enhance fish and wildlife habitat. Those projects can also create additional public benefits such as sustaining agricultural production, improving water quality and water supply reliability, increasing groundwater recharge, and providing public recreation and educational opportunities.

For struggling fish and wildlife, the news that smart flood projects can help fight the impacts of climate change is welcome.  Salmon are a cold water fish. A warming climate stresses salmon and many other species. But multi-benefit flood projects help salmon and other natural resources in many ways. These projects create riparian and wetland habitat, and increased floodplain habitat that is well known for producing larger, healthier juvenile salmon. By allowing more water to pass safely, these projects can allow upstream dam operators to hold more water in reservoirs. More stored water means more cold water at the bottom of the reservoir. This cold water can literally be the different between life and death for salmon eggs and juveniles during the warm months of late summer and early fall.

Some of the many benefits of these new flood projects aren’t obvious at first glance. But among those benefits is a chance to make our rivers, fish, and wildlife more resilient in a warmer future.

Projects underway in California

Thanks to funding provided by the voters and directed by the legislature, over a dozen multi-benefit projects are already in the design and construction phase. These include:

• Breaching the levee at the San Joaquin River National Wildlife Refuge to reconnect 3,000 acres of floodplain.
• Restoring 2,000 acres of riparian and floodplain habitat at the Dos Rios Ranch across the river from SJRNWR.
• Removing a levee to restore 220 acres of floodplain habitat for salmon at Great Valley Grasslands State Park.
• Reconnecting the Oroville Wildlife Area to the Feather River to create rearing habitat for juvenile salmon.
• Setting back 7 miles of levee on the upper Sacramento River to reconnect 1,400 acres of floodplain and improve flood protection for Hamilton City.
• Expanding the floodway on the upper San Joaquin River to provide 100-year protection for the City of Firebaugh along with wildlife habitat and recreational opportunities for an economically disadvantaged community.

The Southport Project in the City of West Sacramento is one of the most exciting and ambitious multi-benefit flood management projects moving forward in the Central Valley. West Sacramento has a population of 52,000 people and is situated on the west side of an urbanized reach of the Sacramento River that is severely constrained by levees. The project is necessary to provide 100-year protection for the established and growing urban center. The project will set-back 5.6 miles of levee creating a new floodplain area 400 to 1,000 feet wide, creating 200 acres of forested wetlands in the heart of the Sacramento metropolitan area. A riverside trail will allow people to enjoy the riverside forest and access the river along the six mile long project, which will ultimately provide high quality habitat for several native species including juvenile rearing habitat for endangered Chinook salmon.

Smart solutions, safer communities

California is leading the way in responding to extreme floods and climate change related flood risks, both by adopting a plan founded in modern flood management, and by building multi-benefit projects on the ground. The broad benefits of this new approach explains why the new flood plan and multi-benefit projects enjoy extraordinarily broad support among California’s agricultural, flood agency, environmental, fishing and scientific stakeholders.

Thanks to the California Department of Water Resources, the Central Valley Flood Protection Board, American Rivers and many other government agencies and conservation organizations, California is preparing for floods in a way that will not only respond to a warming climate and reduce damage when the ARk storm arrives, but will also improve the quality of life for fish, wildlife, and people.

The National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) is not just an insurance program – it is a comprehensive flood risk management program that maps floodplains, issues hazard mitigation grants, and helps community’s implement safe local floodplain ordinances. American Rivers has great interest in the NFIP because it communicates flood risk and promotes community practices to mitigate that flood risk. Strong awareness tools combined with smart and safe floodplain management practices can help guide communities towards less risky development, and result in floodplains that have more room for rivers to safely flood.

Mapping

The NFIP communicates flood risk to communities through its Flood Insurance Rate Maps (FIRMs) produced by the Federal Emergency Management Agency (FEMA). These maps are essential to implementing the NFIP as they indicate where the 100-year (1% annual chance) flood elevation resides. If your community is enrolled in the NFIP and you purchase a home within the 100-year flood elevation you will be required to obtain flood insurance. The trigger of having to purchase flood insurance ensures a property owner knows they will be living in a floodplain, and informs them of their flood risk. The cost of an individual flood insurance policy is defined by where a property is mapped in a community’s FIRM. Thus, the accuracy of these maps is vital to communicating actual risk to communities.

The term 100-year flood is confusing to many people because it refers to a flood that can happen more often than once every 100 years. Naming it the “100-year flood zone” can convey a false sense of security. In reality the 100-year flood actually describes a certain size flood that has a 1% chance of occurring in any given year, and the 100-year flood level is different for each stream and river.

Restrict Development

For a community to enroll in the NFIP they must adopt local zoning and building codes that guide development away from flood-prone areas. Restrictive zoning and flood-proofing building codes in flood-prone areas are mitigation techniques that help to protect a community from flood damage.

Mitigation

American Rivers believes the best way to reduce loss of life and property due to floods is to invest in mitigation before a flood occurs. Mitigation techniques such as relocating flood prone properties, conserving greenspace, and restoring floodplains and wetlands, can remove the threat of flooding to people and property. Communities that invest in mitigation experience less severe impacts and recover more quickly, becoming more resilient to the next flood event.

The NFIP is up for reauthorization at the end of September. Congress must pass this important piece of legislation in order to help communities become more resistant to floods. American Rivers would like to see some reforms in the program including:

• More accurate, current, and accessible mapping based on the best available science and technology (including climate science)
• Improvements to NFIP mitigation programs that will improve resilience
• Incentives for communities to enforce strong local floodplain management, with a focus on using nature-based approaches to flood mitigation
• Increased transparency on property flood history and changes to NFIP rates

Through these reforms, the NFIP can better protect people and property, and support the health of the environment by providing rivers the room to flood safely.

As the people of Houston struggle to recover from Hurricane Harvey, people all across America should consider contributing to the recovery effort and preparing for a flood in their own communities. American Rivers offers a few facts about floods to help people and communities prepare.

1. Floods are the most common natural hazards in the United States.

In terms of number of lives lost and property damage, flooding is the most common natural hazard. Floods can occur at any time of the year, in any part of the country, and at any time of the day or night. While heavy precipitation is the common cause of flooding, hurricanes, winter storms, and snowmelt are common, but often overlooked, causes of flooding.

2. Floodplains provide roughly 25 percent of all land-based ecosystem service benefits yet they represent just 2 percent of Earth’s land surface.

Floodplains are the low lying areas that surround rivers and other water bodies that naturally flood on a frequent basis. Naturally frequent flooding makes floodplains the “lifeblood” to surrounding areas. They provide clean water and wildlife habitat among many other benefits including one of the most visible functions, the ability to store large volumes of flood water and slowly release these waters over time.

3. Wetlands in the U.S. save more than $30 billion in annual flood damage repair costs.

Wetlands act as natural sponges, storing and slowly releasing floodwaters after peak flood flows have passed. A single acre of wetland, saturated to a depth of one foot, will retain 330,000 gallons of water – enough to flood thirteen average-sized homes thigh-deep.

4. Over the past century, we have experienced more intense and frequent storms.

Over the last 50 years, Americans have seen a 20% increase in the heaviest downpours. With a changing climate, we know that the size of the nation’s floodplains will grow by 40 to 45% over the next 90 years, putting more people in harm’s way.

5. In 2011 alone, there were 58 Federal flood disaster declarations, covering 33 different states.

The 2011 flooding damages cost over $8 billion and caused 113 deaths, both exceeded the 30–year averages.

6. The federal government provides flood insurance to homeowners, but the National Flood Insurance Program (NFIP) is $25 billion in debt to federal taxpayers because premiums are not keeping pace with the increasing risk of floods.

Claims have increased significantly over the last 15 years due in large part from Hurricanes Katrina and Sandy, and Hurricane Harvey will certainly increase the overall NFIP debt. Most homeowners at risk of flooding don’t have flood insurance and are thus at the mercy of disaster assistance, which costs taxpayers billions of dollars per year in addition to claims paid by the NFIP.

7. Roughly 17% of all the urban land in the United States is located in the “100-year” or high risk flood zone.

If you live in a high-risk area and you have a federally backed mortgage, you must buy flood insurance. Flood insurance costs vary, but the average cost is $550 per year. If your community participates in FEMA’s voluntary Community Rating System (CRS), you can save up to 45% on your insurance premium. If you live near the 100-year floodplain, you should seriously consider purchasing flood insurance.

8. Over the course of a 30 year mortgage, homeowners in the 100-year floodplain have a 1 in 4 chance or greater of being flooded – twice the probability of fire damage.

Floods are not limited to the 100-year floodplain and 100 year floods can happen more frequently than once every century. Over 20% of the flood insurance claims and one-third of all flood disaster assistance is for flood damage outside the 100-year floodplain. The concept of a 100-year flood is a statistical projection that refers to the flood event that has a 1 percent probability of occurring in each and every year. As the climate changes, the size and area subject to the 100-year flood will increase.

9. Flood mitigation practices that reduce the loss of life and damages to properties provide $5 in benefits for every dollar invested.

When homeowners and communities take steps to protect themselves and to reduce the impacts of flooding through mitigation practices such as elevating or flood-proofing their homes, moving flood prone structures out of harm’s way, and investing in “natural defenses” they can save themselves and taxpayer’s money because it’s less expensive to prepare for a flood than it is to keep cleaning up afterwards.

10. Levees can and do fail often with catastrophic consequences.

An estimated 100,000 miles of levees crisscross the nation. There is no definitive record on the exact number or the condition of those levees. We do know that over 40 percent of the U.S. population lives in counties with levees and that many of these levees were designed decades ago for agricultural purposes but now have homes and businesses behind them. Setting back levees to give rivers more room to safely carry flood waters is often the best way to protect communities from catastrophic floods. Giving rivers more room provides other benefits such as clean water, parks, and wildlife habitat.