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June 28, 2004 - Subscribe - Contact Us - Rate Card - Place an Ad Valley&State Backpage O&E Sports Archives Classifieds Faith&Beliefs Obituaries Revels April 3, 2004 Shedding light on the situation By Vickie Aldous Ashland Daily Tidings Pink petals that fell from a blooming fruit tree collect in miniature logjams behind stones and sticks as Roca Creek trickles down a grassy ravine lined with cottonwoods, oaks and purple wildflowers. Birds call and flit through the trees. A standing snag is dotted with holes drilled by acorn woodpeckers to store their namesake food. Just three feet wide at its broadest points, the creek is a favorite spot for neighbors and Southern Oregon University students who frequent the paths crisscrossing the ravine. Walker Elementary School students line up to mark the new path of a stream they are going to take out of a pipe and let run above the ground across the school property. Satsuki Doi | Ashland Daily Tidings But the creek has barely made its entry into Ashland from the hills above town before it passes through a metal grate and disappears into a storm drain pipe beneath an SOU parking lot. Only later is it released from its dark, confined passageway and allowed to finish its journey to Bear Creek at the bottom of the valley. Richard Hart, a scientist who has worked on watershed monitoring and restoration projects in Ashland and elsewhere, said the section of Roca Creek above SOU is a reminder of how the stream looked before the city's development. "It's a legacy of the past in that little patch there," he said. A common fate Prior to the construction and expansion of town, Roca Creek and numerous other streams flowed unimpeded from the hills to Bear Creek. Ashland Creek has remained above ground, but many smaller streams were viewed as nuisances to be shunted into the network of pipes that make up the city's storm drain system. Those pipes eventually drain to Ashland Creek and Bear Creek. "The development of the town and the desire to have neighborhoods and streets and sidewalks spelled the demise of the natural flow of water through the city limits," Hart said. "There are 13 subdrainages that run through the city. Most of them, in at least one point of traveling to Bear Creek, do pass through the storm drain system." The combined water flow from the streams that flow invisibly beneath the city would probably equal one-third to one-half of Ashland Creek's flow, he said. "You don't know they're there unless you listen to a storm gutter on a sunny day and say, 'Where's that water coming from?'" Hart said. The plight of Ashland's underground streams is becoming more clear as City of Ashland staff map the storm drain system and its outlets to comply with new National Pollution Discharge Emissions Standards affecting mid-sized cities. As part of that effort, a stream map done by a private firm shows squiggly lines representing creeks above town. More squiggles are shown below town, but much of Ashland appears as a virtual black hole, with Ashland Creek as a notable exception. "In Ashland, there are a lot of streams coming into the storm drain system. They disappear and reappear on the lower side of town. There's a big hole in the central part of the city," said Richard Best, a City of Ashland GIS technician who is mapping storm drain outlets. "Streams, especially the smaller ones, were diverted underground. It was easier from an engineering perspective, but there was a loss of wildlife habitat." Resurrecting a stream Across the nation and in other countries, communities are beginning to question the wisdom of keeping streams underground. Many cities have found that "daylighting" a stream - or bringing it above ground and letting it flow through a recreated channel - is cheaper than replacing aging storm system pipes, according to the National Park Service. The 1986 daylighting of Arcadia Creek in Kalamazoo, Mich., helped revitalize the blighted downtown as businesses and festivals were drawn to the waterfront, the park service reported. Aquatic and riparian vegetation in and along daylighted streams can take up pollutants. Water can percolate through the stream bed, slowing and reducing storm run-off, and daylighted creeks provide wildlife habitat, researcher Richard Pinkham wrote in the journal Stormwater. In Ashland, curiosity provided the spark for a plan to daylight a portion of Paradise Creek across Walker Elementary School. "Last year, the kids noticed they could hear the sound of running water. We researched it and found there had been a stream there but it had been culverted," said Tim Brandy, a teacher at the school. Students plan to dig a meandering stream channel, and with help from the City of Ashland Public Works Department, take Paradise Creek out of a storm drain pipe and allow it to flow above ground. Earlier this week, students lined up outside to mark the channel's course. A photo of the students will be used by Keith Massie, father of a fourth-grader at the school and Jackson County GIS manager, to create a map of the channel, according to Brandy. Massie already has experience with Paradise Creek in a more natural state. A cattail-lined portion of the stream runs across his Peachey Road property above Siskiyou Boulevard before it descends into a storm drain. He said some people are worried that the daylighted creek on the school grounds will pose a danger. "I have heard more than one person say, 'What about when it rains? Kids will fall in and drown,'" Massie said. But through the use of a diverter, only a controlled volume of Paradise Creek water will be allowed into the new stream channel. Excess water will remain in the stormdrain system, according to Jim Olson, city surveyor and project manager. "It's not going to be a hazard for children falling in," he said. The daylighted creek will be returned to the storm drain system through an inlet provided by the City of Ashland once it flows past the school, Olson said. Brandy estimated that with the students digging the stream channel, carrying and placing stones and planting riparian vegetation this summer and fall, the project will cost about $2,000 to $2,500. The school is seeking a grant and donations to fund the project. Students currently take field trips to the North Mountain Park natural area, but with the daylighted stream at the school, they will be able to study aquatic insects, riparian vegetation, birds and other natural resources right outside their classrooms. "It will bring science back here. We can study it right on site. It really will be a science lab for us," Brandy said. DailyTidings.com Home Page Valley&State | Backpage | O&E | Sports | Archives | Weather | Classifieds Columnists | Faith&Beliefs | Obituaries | Revels | Subscribe | Contact Us Copyright 2004 Ashland Daily Tidings and Ottaway Newspapers All Rights Reserved Click Here Site Search: .:Advertisements:. RESOURCES - Mail Tribune News - ODOT Road Cams