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Heagle Park Floodplain Restoration

IT'S A GRAND SLAM AT UPPER COLORADO GULCH. REDUCING FLOODING, RESTORING CRUCIAL HABITATS, AND RETURNING THE BANKS OF THE BIGWOOD RIVER TO A NATURAL STATE IS A
WIN-WIN-WIN.

PROBLEMS AND LIMITING FACTORS AND HISTORY

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The area south of Heagle Park in Hailey was once the site of a wastewater treatment plant, known as the Riverside Plant. It was built in the early 1970’s to accommodate development in the area. The Riverside Plant provided wastewater service to residents of the community until 2000, which at that time served about 1,500 people. The plant operated for about 29 years until the facility was converted into a pump station (Riverside Pump Station). Today, the collection system gathers wastewater from various sources in Hailey and conveys them to the Woodside Treatment Plant. 

The plant itself required diking and rip rapping in order to prevent erosion damage from the river. The solution to prevent back-flow surging of the plant was to add onto the effluent line and run it downstream until the river gradient dropped low enough to not force water back through the plant. That effluent pipeline is still visible along the stream bank and is no longer needed with the current Riverside Lift Station and the Woodside Treatment Plant.

 

Clearly this reach of the Big Wood River has been heavily altered by anthropogenic activities, which has resulted in highly unstable conditions prone to excessive deposition, bank erosion, and residential flooding. The large magnitude flood (greater than 50-year return interval) experienced in the Big Wood River in 2017 resulted in widespread flooding, erosion, and woody debris recruitment across the basin. Excessive sediment supply and insufficient transport capacity in the project area resulted in sediment and woody debris deposition within the Big Wood River channel. These changes within the river channel have resulted in increased flooding  within the project vicinity.

 

In response to an increased awareness and desire to implement flood mitigation efforts, the scope of the Hailey Greenway Master Plan (HGMP) was revised in July 2017 to include additional analysis and information on river system management throughout the greenway corridor. This project near Heagle Park was identified in the HGMP river management recommendations technical memorandum. The recommendation from the Big Wood River Atlas was to remove rip rap, old road grades, and restore channel  processes to a reach that has been impacted by artificial confinement.  

PROJECT GOALS & BENEFITS

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  • Replace armored banks with natural materials to increase fish habitat diversity and reduce erosion potential.

  • Improve conveyance in side channel to provide spawning and rearing habitat for fish at high flows. These ephemeral habitats are of great importance in the big wood, when spring run off coincides with the migration of trout upstream to spawn and rear. they provide softer water that is more energetically efficient than high velocity flows in the main channel. 

  • Reestablish floodplain connectivity at more frequent intervals by excavating to natural elevation grade

  • Jumpstart riparian succession for lasting results

  • Remove wastewater effluent pipes

  • Improve overall aesthetics and walkability which will increase community value, use, appearance, access, and safety. 

  • The proposed treatments were identified as best management practices in the Big Wood River Atlas that were adopted by Blaine County. 

Before:

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After:

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PROJECT PARTNERS

  • City of Hailey

  • Idaho Water Resources Board

  • Blaine County

  • Flood Control District 9

  • Enviromental Science Associates

  • Oxbow Earthworks

  • Trout & Salmon Foundation

  • WRV Collaborative Forest Enhancement  Group

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