{"id":3310,"date":"2016-11-21T01:29:03","date_gmt":"2016-11-21T07:29:03","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.savebuffalobayou.org\/?page_id=3310"},"modified":"2017-04-23T13:26:19","modified_gmt":"2017-04-23T18:26:19","slug":"wasting-money-the-old-fashioned-way","status":"publish","type":"page","link":"https:\/\/www.savebuffalobayou.org\/?page_id=3310","title":{"rendered":"Wasting Money the Old-Fashioned Way"},"content":{"rendered":"

Costly Bayou Repairs Do More Harm Than Good, Won\u2019t Last<\/h3>\n

Nov. 21, 2016<\/p>\n

Updated April 23, 2017 — The Harris County Flood Control District reports that repair costs through March 2017 are $1.25 million. Terry Hershey Park remains closed until construction work is complete.<\/em><\/p>\n

See also “Commissioner Radack Responds.”<\/a><\/em><\/p>\n

From a distance you could hear the monstrous roar of the heavy equipment in the woods. Following deep, wide tracks smashed into the bare dirt along the bank of Buffalo Bayou, passing large cottonwoods apparently cut to make way for the big equipment, we came across a scene of troubling destruction.<\/p>\n

A gigantic articulated 30-ton dump truck with six massive wheels was slowly rolling towards us with a large load of fresh dirt and dripping mud dug up from the bayou bank. Further along a 60-ton excavator on tracks sat on the very edge of the bank, expertly swiveling back and forth, scraping up the dirt bank and dumping it into the truck, scooping up loads of white limestone rock and dropping it in a layer where the excavated bank once was.<\/p>\n

We\u2019d seen the eroded bank before the \u201crepairs\u201d began. This damage was far worse.<\/p>\n

It didn\u2019t have to be this way.<\/p>\n

\"Dump<\/a>

Dump truck and excavator at work on the north bank of Buffalo Bayou in Terry Hershey Park on Nov. 3, 2016. Photo by Jim Olive<\/p><\/div>\n

\"Fallen<\/a>

Fallen trees and eroded path on north bank of Buffalo Bayou before repairs began. Note darker patch of asphalt indicating trail had been repaired previously. Fallen trees should have been left in place against the bank to collect sediment and rebuild the bank naturally and for free. Note riparian plants already stabilizing the sediment. Photo taken August 19, 2016.<\/p><\/div>\n

What Was Wrong With This Scene and Why Was It Happening?<\/strong><\/h4>\n

The heavy equipment was at work in Terry Hershey Park<\/a> in far west Houston, where contractors hired by the Harris County Flood Control District were making what were described as \u201cemergency repairs\u201d<\/a> to the north bank of the bayou. Flooding and extended high waters released from the dams last spring had eaten away at the bank and the asphalt path built on the water\u2019s edge. The district has identified at least a dozen sites to be repaired between Dairy Ashford Road and Beltway 8<\/a>.<\/p>\n

But everything they were doing was among the more environmentally damaging, expensive, and outdated practices possible\u2014short of actually lining the bayou with concrete\u2014and also likely will end up needing to be done all over again.<\/p>\n

And if you don\u2019t care about the biological health of our bayous and streams, or about the cleanliness of the water flowing through them, past our houses and parks and into the bay, or about erosion and flooding downstream, you might care about your tax dollars being flushed down the river.<\/p>\n

And yes, in addition to clean water and common sense, we are concerned about flooding upstream and downstream and the predicament we have with the dams that drain into the bayou here<\/a>. But note that this repair project is not about increasing the flow in the bayou or fixing flooding. (It may increase flooding. See below.) It\u2019s about putting the banks and sidewalks back where the bayou doesn\u2019t want them to be and trying to make them stay there.<\/p>\n

We have to ask why.\u00a0 There are cheaper and more sensible courses of action.<\/p>\n

\"Looking<\/a>

Looking upstream at the excavated north bank of Buffalo Bayou in Terry Hershey Park. A layer of limestone rock will be covered with fill and more rock. Photo by Jim Olive, Nov. 3, 2016<\/p><\/div>\n

Some <\/strong>History<\/strong><\/h4>\n

Terry Hershey Park<\/a> is a popular 500-acre linear park with hike and bike trails, both paved and natural, stretching for about six miles along Buffalo Bayou in West Houston between Barker Dam<\/a> (Highway 6) and Beltway 8 (Sam Houston Tollway), and along a tributary draining Addicks Dam<\/a> south of Interstate 10.<\/p>\n

The bayou here was once a forested, meandering stream. More than half of the bayou along this stretch was stripped, dredged, and straightened by the US Army Corps of Engineers in the early 1940s to serve as a drainage channel for the federal dams then under construction. There are still oxbow lakes in the area that were once part of the slow-moving, winding river. In the 1950s much of the rest was stripped and channelized, and plans were developed to line the channelized bayou in concrete all the way downstream to Shepherd Drive. That project was eventually stopped in the 1960s by a popular movement of concerned Houstonians, including Terry Hershey, George Mitchell, then US Rep. George H.W. Bush, and a great many others<\/a>, whose concern proved to be far-sighted. Stripping, straightening, and hardening the banks of streams is no longer accepted practice\u00a0for flood control.<\/p>\n

More recently homeowners on the south bank<\/a> of the bayou have been successful in persuading the city not to raze forest for detention on the bayou<\/a>. (Detention, now considered the first line of defense against flooding, is temporarily detaining or slowing stormwater so that all the water doesn’t rush into storm drains, pipes, streets, and streams all at once, overwhelming the system. Detention can be anything from angled gutter pipes to porous driveways, swales and rain gardens to tall grass<\/a>, trees<\/a>, prairies<\/a>, wetlands<\/a>, and large ponds<\/a>.) The flood control district also has promoted plans to cut trees in the park for detention. Members of Save Our Forest<\/a> urge the city and county to seek regional alternatives for detaining storm water.<\/p>\n

Shortly after the concrete project was dropped in the 1960s, the federal government sold the 500 acres that are now the park to the flood control district, and in the following decades the district left the stripped, straightened bayou to revert to a more natural state. Trees and plants grew back. In the 1990s the district entered into an agreement to lease the land to Harris County. Dirt paths were paved with concrete and asphalt. The county created Terry Hershey Park, now managed and maintained by Harris County Precinct 3.<\/p>\n

But the bayou, growing stronger with increasing rains and higher flows from development upstream, continues to seek out its historic meanders. And our research shows that the historic meanders are where the banks and sidewalks have repeatedly failed.<\/p>\n

Geologist Tom Helm<\/a> has done the research connecting the meanders and the bank erosion. Watch this brief slide show created by Helm showing the historic meanders and the geologic fault lines that caused the river to wind in a section of Buffalo Bayou between N. Wilcrest and Beltway 8. The slideshow also includes for comparison a map of the disturbed areas being repaired in the area.<\/p>\n

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