One issue with utilization is cost to clean up the combined sewer overflow; MSD reported in its executive summary from Feb. 2011 that it would be about $2 billion to totally remove CSOs (see http://www.stlmsd.com/educationoutreach ... ummary.pdf).

I'm not sure what the $945 million bond issue passed in June will go toward, but it is dedicated to reduction (but not elimination) of CSOs in the Mississippi River and elsewhere (see http://www.stltoday.com/news/local/govt ... f6878.html).

Michael Allen did a nice post about how things got this way (http://preservationresearch.com/2010/11 ... e-a-sewer/).

Second issue that I just thought about was that the River Des Peres doesn't have a consistent water level that could allow for the type of activities that would be really cool. I'm not sure businesses could survive the erratic water levels.

Interesting look at the extent to which MSD is tackling its obligations...

http://www.bizjournals.com/stlouis/news ... s-for.html

There's an open house on March 9th about an extension of the River des Peres Greenway from Slay Park to the Shrewsbury Station along Ellendale. It's another incremental step towards one day daylighting that sewer and making a proper waterway out of it again.
http://secure.campaigner.com/CSB/public ... MTYxNDk%3d

This particular stretch is a big deal in light of the two-mile connection recently announced between Grant's Trail and the River des Peres trail. We are getting closer and closer to a continuous connection from Washington University's main campus to the Tyson Research Center, and that is an absurd distance. Not a very direct connection, but it brings a lot of stuff together.

^ would be exciting. that first photo with the tv btw looks like an public art installation.

Those images are kind of depressing Gary. I understand why they could be appealing, but they're still broken systems without any variety. The first minus the TV looked a lot better for wildlife and casual recreation. The after images just show water, mown grass, and harsh unnatural edges. That barren rip rap needs vegetation. There are better ways of broadening and slowing rivers down to allow for recreational boating while still allowing for the flow of nutrients and river fauna. A wider, shallower river is required, but the corps of engineers works against it in favor of barges and barges only. You can see river training in action on google maps if you look at the Omaha area. It makes the river narrower and narrower. It looks like this,



Hard channelizing of the river in places has to be done to protect bridge footings, buildings, etc., but the whole water system shouldn't be so locked down. There should be room for oxbows and point bars too. A wider river naturally moves slower and allows for shallows where you can stand with your kayak or canoe.

Point bars are basically sandy beaches. They just need maintenance crews to go through them to rake out the sharp foot cutting bits, pick up driftwood, and remove the abundant trash. With a slower, cleaner river you can jump across little streams and out into the sand bars without fear of losing your life.



The Missouri runs silty so its bars are more mud than sand, but that is again due to the upstream training of the river to be deeper, faster, and ever gouging the river bottom without letting anything settle. I really doubt the Missouri was so muddy two hundred years ago. Certainly damning up the Missouri around here would be impossible because it would silt up immediately.

Broadening the river to meander through its flood plain and employing wetland gardeners that know how to use sedges, rushes, and willows to clean it would be considerably cheaper than dams, and the outcomes would be far better.

More like these:

Every time I hear that this couldn't be done, I just think there's gotta be an answer though - that's what engineers are for right? Did that OK River article say how much that costed the city? It's such a great idea - and it GRG designed it...

Some might say it couldn't be done. I would say that it shouldn't be done. I'd join the protest.

Ah, ok ok. I thought we were talking about damning the Mississippi.

Any water that runs through a concrete channel is an unhealthy mess of sun baked bacteria. The river des peres is in a bad bad state in addition to being completely inaccessible. Ideally, it should be given it's own natural course through dirt and riparian sedges and rushes, with cardinal flowers, queen of the prairie, joe pye weed, and all the other things that would be happy to grow along it and clean it up.

You can put paths along the river at ever greater heights. Like here you can see there are at least three parallel paths at different elevations on both sides of the yangjae stream.



Then during high water it looks like this and it is no worse for wear. In fact the upper paths are still just fine. When the whole water system is allowed to flood like this, it can absorb gigantic amounts of water without endangering people's homes. Because the water runs over grasses and plants rather than concrete, quite a lot can also be sucked into the ground, which across a whole system can mean that the floods that do happen are not so bad.



I mean seriously, where do we expect water to go in ugly scenarios like this:

We went to Willmore Park yesterday on our quest to let our dog visit every city park, and the separation of the park from the river and the trail on the other side was pathetic. I know south city is not where the river des peres fight must take place, but it's where the biggest outcomes ought to be. It's a tragic thing that we just persist like this.

There are probably four arenas of action. Two are impossible now, so we must focus on the two that can be addressed.

1) The northern river des peres has to be cleaned up. That's in University City and the Engelholm Creek branch that begins up at UMSL and flows through Pagedale and some very industrial stuff like scrap yards, a cement dump, an asphalt recycler, a porta-potty storage yard, and the ameren power depot. All of that goes underground at Olive and Skinker. If the upper river des peres could be cleaned up to flow naturally we'd have a good impact on neighborhoods that need attention. The St. Vincent Greenway has great potential for making a big difference with the Engelholm section. Making the upper branches healthy would let us move attention south.

2) Forest Park must undergo a huge investment to replace their tap water system with water from the natural streams from the north. North county's stormwater should go to the grand basin while sewage should stay in the sewers. This would be a miracle.

3) The Deer Creek watershed where all the money and effort goes already cleans West County for what pours into the fake river in south city. It's a big job, and I trust them to do that while other people do the harder bit.

4) The entire stretch of river from the Hill to the Patch has to be widened, reconfigured, and landscaped. To some extent that means a lot more attention needs to be paid to stormwater drains along Hampton and Kingshighway. Everything from roughly Morganford to the city limits drains to the river des peres. The whitest part of south city has an obvious task to own and fight for. It's just that the problem is too huge to really address.


Of these four areas, I've spent the most time trying to work on (1). Lately I've been trying to understand what a city resident can do about (4), and it is intimidating.

Do you guys have any ideas about what individuals could do?

Just FTR

https://nextstl.com/2017/04/300m-lighth ... ves-ahead/
$300M LIGHTHOUSE ENTERTAINMENT, MARINA, RETAIL DEVELOPMENT MOVES AHEAD IN ST. LOUIS CITY