The Vicksburg District has
had ample opportunity to prove its engineering expertise through
more than the construction of levees, dams, and harbors. District
interest also includes environmental protection and restoration,
recreation, water resources development, and many other areas. The
district has found innovative answers to many questions, setting
standards for engineering nationwide. For better than 60 years,
silt- and pesticide- laden runoff was channeled into Lake Chicot,
the largest natural lake in Arkansas. Most of the sport aquatic
life was killed and the lake filled slowly with silt. The $90-million
Lake Chicot Pumping Plant project, including auxiliary structures,
keeps poor quality water from entering the lake, channeling it to
the Mississippi River instead. The project, designed to return life
to the lake, will enhance the overall quality of life in a three-state
area and includes other considerations such as flood control, water
supply, and recreation in addition to environmental restoration.
Each district lake has qualities which benefit
the public. The nationally recognized Lake Ouachita Geo-Float Trail
guides boaters around the lake, highlighting and describing many
geological formations unique to the area. The trail calls attention
to the special beauty of the area and gives visitors an increased
understanding of the formation of the Ouachita Mountains. The trail
was the first water-based interpretive trail included in the National
Trails System.
Downtown Monroe, Louisiana, faced a difficult
flooding problem prior to the 1970s. Floodwalls and levees, completed
in the mid- 1930s, protected the city from the Ouachita River with
the exception of a 1,750-foot gap in the heart of the business district.
This gap was filled with an ultramodern floodwall designed by the
Vicksburg District that provides adequate protection and an unobstructed,
aesthetically pleasing view of the river. The cantilevered design
of the floodwall allows it to serve as a sidewalk when not raised
against a flood.
DeGray Dam was the first Corps hydropower dam
using a pump-back, reversible generator to ensure an ample water
supply for peak-load power generation. Though used for years in
Europe, pump-back generators have only recently become economically
competitive in the United States. Realizing that rain might not
always replenish water used for power generation, reversible turbines
are used to pump water from a storage reservoir below the dam back
up to the power pool for reuse.
The Corps has found a way to make a river's destructive
force work to stop erosion, especially along the Red River in Louisiana
and Arkansas. Trenchfill revetment uses the natural tendency of
a river to cut its banks to simplify the placement of stone bank
protection. A trench is dug on dry land along the desired channel
alignment and filled with stone. The current of the river continues
to cut into the old bank until, eventually, the stone-filled trench
is reached. When the stone is undercut, it falls to cover the bank,
preventing further erosion.
Today's challenges are more complex and controversial.
The Vicksburg District of the 21st century is using engineers, planners,
and environmental staff to redesign ongoing projects to make them
more environmentally friendly, and design other projects to restore
environmental areas diminished by man over the years.
The resources of the Vicksburg District are also
being called upon by local and state Governments to support their
engineering efforts under new programs that permit the Corps to
assist in ways never before possible.
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