Our view: Chester Creek
Restoration project enhances one of the loveliest places in town
Anchorage Daily News, 07/01/2009
Westchester Lagoon. Credit: Anchorage Daily News
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Federal salmon restoration money has brought Anchorage a gem of a creek improvement at WestchesterLagoon. The $12 million project restores a much more natural outfall for Chester Creek, which had beenhemmed in by the Alaska Railroad embankment. Before, the embankment acted like a dam, and the creek drained underneath it through the hydraulic equivalent of a trapdoor. Now, the creek flows freely out of the lagoon, gurgling pleasantly through a large 'S' curve lined with rock, new vegetation and aviewing platform, then rushes through a big new, reinforced opening under the railroad tracks. Freeingup the creek required building a handsome wooden bridge for the Coastal Trail, which crosses the outfall.
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View Slide Show of Westchester Lagoon Improved
Coastal Program helps rebuild Salmon Creek
John Driscoll, The Times-Standard, 01/26/2008
The tide gushes into Salmon Creek, pushing thousands of gallons of water into the remnant channel that is the main tributary to South Humboldt Bay.
Salmon Creek floods the Humboldt Bay National Wildlife Refuge north of Loleta, but only vaguely resembles what it once was: A complex of braided channels flowing through the lowland salt marsh. Diking, draining and ditching long ago turned the lower portion of the creek into a shallow, flood-prone stream choking on silt that came from the upper watershed.
The refuge, with a slew of partners including the Arcata U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service office and the California Department of Fish and Game, is trying to revive -- at least in part -- a creek that once was something of a salmon factory.
”It wasn't named Salmon Creek for no reason,” said Mitch Farro with the Pacific Coast Fish, Wildlife and Wetlands Restoration Association.
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What Is a Coastal Ecosystem?
A "coastal ecosystem" includes estuaries and coastal waters and lands located at the lower end of drainage basins, where stream and river systems meet the sea and are mixed by tides. The coastal ecosystem includes
saline, brackish (mixed saline and fresh) and fresh waters, as well as coastlines and the adjacent lands.
 All these water and land forms interact as integrated ecological units. Shorelands, dunes, offshore islands, barrier islands, headlands, and freshwater wetlands within estuarine drainages are included in the definition since
these interrelated features are crucial to coastal fish and wildlife and their habitats. A variety of animals, and plants complete the ecological system. The definition of "coastal ecosystem" also applies to the
Great Lakes, where enormous bodies of freshwater play an ecological role similar to oceans.
Coastal wetlands are commonly called lagoons, salt marshes or tidelands. If you live along the coast, these natural systems are likely to be a common sight, although in many areas, coastal wetlands were among the first places to be converted and developed for human activities.
Why Is the Coastal Program Needed?
Our Nation's coasts provide important fish and wildlife habitat, far beyond their limited geographic extent. Coastal ecosystems comprise less than 10 percent of the Nation's land area, but support far greater proportions of our living resources. Specifically, coastal areas support a much higher percentage of the Nation's threatened and endangered species fishery
resources, migratory songbirds, and migrating and wintering waterfowl.
Today, these species and their habitats face serious threats in coastal regions from human population growth and the development and disturbance that are often a consequence of growth. Population projections indicate that our coastlines will continue to receive the majority of the Nation's growth and development, promising to compound today's habitat losses.
As habitat is degraded, reduced or eliminated, plants and animals suffer population losses that can lead to the need for protection under the Endangered Species Act. The Service's Coastal Program is working to avoid further species declines by enhancing the agency's efforts within the Nation's coastal areas and securing funding for conservation, including habitat restoration efforts.
How the Coastal Program Works
The Coastal Program integrates all Service activities in high priority coastal ecosystems to:
- Identify the most important natural resource problems and solutions;
- Influence the planning and decision-making processes of other agencies and organizations with the Service's living resource capabilities;
- Implement solutions on-the-ground in partnership with others; and
- Instill a stewardship ethic, and catalyze the public to help solve problems, change behaviors, and promote ecologically sound decisions.
Since the great majority of the Nation's coastal areas are in private hands, conservation of these ecologically important habitats is vital to protecting coastal natural resources. The key is to find solutions that ensure self-sustaining natural systems despite conflicting demands on our natural resources.
The Coastal Program provides incentives for voluntary protection of threatened, endangered and other species on private and public lands alike. The program's protection and restoration successes to date give hope that, through the cooperative efforts of many public and private partners, adequate coastal habitat for fish and wildlife will exist for future generations. |
