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On
September 17, 2004, lashing from the remnants of Hurricane Ivan deposited an average of 6.25 inches of rain in a 24 hour period over the 277 square mile
watershed,
spiking water levels in Chartiers Creek to 23.98 feet, topping the banks in
many low-lying communities. Peak flow was 23,.500 cubic feet per
second, or 175,000 gallons per second, greater than the combined flow over
the American & Bridal Falls at Niagara Falls, which is 150,000 gallons
per second.
Diverting excess flow to natural
floodplains which can accommodate the extra water, like Crafton's, above,
should form an integral part of any regional or watershed stormwater
management plan. The rain fell on
ground fully saturated from Hurricane Frances, forming an
unprecedented series of events that led to what is now characterized as
the 500 year flood. But is it?
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stormwater
management
stream daylighting
mine drainage
macro
& microbiology
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New
Report Outlines Regional Approach to Solving Water Quality Problems in
Southwestern PA
PITTSBURGH (Jan. 6)
A comprehensive,
watershed-based approach is needed to effectively address water
quality problems in southwestern Pennsylvania, says a new report from
the National Academies' National Research Council. The report outlines
a technical framework called the Three Rivers "Comprehensive
Watershed Assessment and Response Plan" (CWARP) to deal with
these problems, and suggests ways to better unify and coordinate the
region's efforts. Currently, water planning and management in
southwestern Pennsylvania is highly fragmented; federal and state
governments, 11 counties, hundreds of municipalities, and other
entities all play roles, but with little coordination or cooperation.
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"Creating
a cooperative regional effort will be challenging, but southwestern
Pennsylvania's water planning issues need to be addressed on that
scale, using a comprehensive approach that takes into account multiple
uses, needs, and impacts, such as water supply, habitat protection,
recreation, and future development," said Jerome Gilbert, chair
of the committee that wrote the report, and a consulting engineer in
Orinda, Calif. "The region's waters have long been an important
asset, but for the area to reach its full potential in terms of
recreational use of the rivers and riverbank development, it is
important to clean up the waters further and meet standards for water
quality." The committee was asked to assess the region's water
quality problems and recommend ways that multiple jurisdictions could
work together to solve them.
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The most pressing
water quality problem with the potential to cause human health
problems is microbial contamination from improperly managed human
wastewater, says the report. In the region's main rivers -- the
Allegheny, Monongahela, and Ohio -- stormwater and sewer overflows
during wet weather appear to be the major contributors. In many
tributaries, microbial water quality does not meet standards even in
dry weather, the report adds, which suggests contamination from
failing septic systems. Livestock management practices in rural areas
are likely adding pathogens to streams as well, though scarce data
made it impossible to determine how much, the committee said. In
addition to biological contaminants, acid drainage from abandoned coal
mines continues to pollute area streams, though this water quality
problem is broader than southwestern Pennsylvania and is being
addressed by existing state and federal programs.
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A
pervasive lack of adequate data hampered the committee's ability to
fully evaluate and prioritize the region's water quality problems and
their adverse effects, the report says. For example, there is no
evidence that southwestern Pennsylvania has experienced any recent
disease outbreaks as a result of poor water quality, but significant
gaps in public health monitoring prevented a thorough assessment.
Efforts to collect more data on water problems -- and to use it to
inform decisions and measure progress -- should be made as the region
works to implement solutions, the committee said.
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As
a first step toward improving its waters, southwestern Pennsylvania
should improve the use of its existing infrastructure. To this end,
the committee strongly recommended that all of the watershed's
wastewater collection systems comply with EPA's Capacity, Management,
Operations, and Maintenance (CMOM) policy or a similar program.
Currently
only three small sub-basins within the lower Chartiers watershed are
in compliance, as the map to the left illustrates. Sewage was
identified by the River's Conservation Plan (RCP) as one of the main
issues facing stakeholders in the lower watershed.
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The
report's proposed approach should be used to plan and implement
further improvements. CWARP's five-step framework could be used to
identify and assess water problems, model their progression, formulate
alternative strategies for addressing them, and implement strategies
in an adaptive, flexible way. This will ensure that the region will
get the most benefit from dollars invested in water quality
improvement. The report explains in detail how CWARP could be
implemented in southwestern Pennsylvania, but it could also be used as
a model for other regions, as many of the problems and challenges
addressed in this study can be found around the country.
In
southwestern Pennsylvania's case, CWARP should be applied at each of
four "scales": the river basin, the metropolitan (multicounty)
region, rural areas, and the urban core. For each scale, the report
suggests institutional structures to help unify the municipalities'
various efforts to improve water quality. The Southwestern
Pennsylvania Commission, for example, is probably the best choice to
lead water planning for the metropolitan region. But that commission
would need to broaden its representation, the committee said, and
should establish a Three Rivers Regional Water Forum to include
representatives from local governments, the private sector, academia,
and environmental organizations -- in short, any group that would play
some role in implementing CWARP.
The
Allegheny County Sanitary Authority (ALCOSAN), which is largely
responsible for managing wastewater for the City of Pittsburgh and 82
surrounding communities, should re-evaluate its draft long-term plan
for controlling sewage and stormwater overflows, in light of the
recently completed municipal consent orders initiated by EPA to
enforce compliance with the Clean Water Act; ongoing negotiations
regarding an ALCOSAN consent decree; compliance with CMOM; and
information from CWARP as it is developed in the future. The CWARP
framework is recommended for the development of ALCOSAN's final
control plan and similar documents because of the data limitations and
technical and institutional complexities that exist in southwestern
Pennsylvania, the committee said. Furthermore, ALCOSAN and other
wastewater treatment providers should investigate decentralized and
innovative alternatives such as storing and treating overflows at
remote locations or in nearby abandoned mines -- as is currently being
evaluated by the Township of Upper St. Clair. A first step toward any
of these options would be development of a system for real-time
control of overflows -- a method that uses software to monitor, model,
and manage flows.
Financing
water quality improvements will not be easy given the magnitude of the
problems, the report acknowledges. In choosing among strategies
yielded by the CWARP process, organizations should let
cost-effectiveness be their primary guide.
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The
study was sponsored by the Allegheny Conference on Community
Development. The National Research Council is the principal operating
arm of the National Academy of Sciences and the National Academy of
Engineering. It is a private, nonprofit institution that provides
science and technology advice under a congressional charter.Copies
of Regional Cooperation for Water Quality Improvement in Southwestern
Pennsylvania are available from the National
Academies Press
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Can
residents & businesses do something?
Read the
STORMWATER PRIMER
stormwater
management | stream daylighting
| mine drainage | macro
& microbiology
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Removing
streams from combined sewers is a high priority. In wet weather, these
streams swell with runoff, enter the combined sewer systems and
greatly reduce the sewers’ capacities to convey sanitary sewage,
resulting in combined sewage overflows discharging directly into local
streams. Currently in Sheraden Park, there is a clean, surface stream
that emanates from a wooded hillside, flows for 300 feet, then drops
into a combined sewer, and goes to ALCOSAN for unnecessary treatment.
This project demonstrates how one stream can be separated from a
combined sewer and restored with ecological sensitivity to the surface
of a city park. This Stream Daylighting
Project can be a highly visible regional and national demonstration project.
Alcosan
has undertaken a Preliminary Design that will bring the project to 30%
completion. They have selected an engineering firm (Michael Baker) and
a restoration firm (Biohabitats) to begin this work. A project of this
magnitude has many re-engineering considerations and stakeholders, not
the least of which are the people who live in the vicinity of the park
and use its ballfields, tennis courts, playground, and public pool.
Public discourse solicited residents’ input to hear their voices in this restoration process.
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Check
out our DAYLIGHTING
page for ALCOSAN updates
stormwater
management | stream daylighting
| mine drainage | macro
& microbiology
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ABANDONED
MINE
DRAINAGE
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You can
see the change in the water between Mayview and Carnegie. Why is Chartiers Creek so brown below
Bridgeville and all of the way to the Ohio River? Where's it coming
from? What's being done about it? Who's doing what? In June 2005, a public meeting in Carnegie
updated
stakeholders with the results of a four year study of AMD supported by
the PA Dept of Environmental Protection.
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Principal researchers, Robert
Hedin, Ph.D., ecologist, Hedin Environmental and Thomas Gray, P.E.,
engineer, GAI Consultants presented a program summarizing studies
of the chemistry, flow and general degradation of nine major mine
discharges located between Bridgeville and Carnegie. These inflows
pollute the remaining 15 miles of Chartiers Creek on its 52 mile
journey from Washington County. Along with its affected tributaries, about 27 miles
of streams show poor chemistry and brownish iron-laden turbidity. One discharge fouls the final 4 miles
of Miller Run from Gladden, while the
old three mile backchannel that forms the boundary between Collier, Bridgeville and
Scott municipalities is affected from Trader Jack’s to Chem Tech.
Most discharges travel only tenths of a mile on
minor tributaries. Some are piped directly into Chartier Creek.
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AMD
has long been documented as the major threat to water quality in the
lower Chartiers watershed. Before these recent studies it was last
documented 35 years ago about the time the US Army Corp of Engineers
dredged and re-channelled Chartiers Creek for flood control. Things
have changed with new discharges, new chemistry and different amounts.
Not only does this problem give that ugly brown-stained look, seen
from the Parkway West, but it also pollutes the habitat for supporting
aquatic and plant life of a healthy stream. Now there is current
information about AMD that is enabling a look at the engineering
possibilities for remediation. Not only is this information about the
surface flows, but now subsurface mine pool maps have been compiled
and can guide new technological designs. Most recently these
discharges have been ranked by their damage and feasibility for both
technical and economical treatment. Preliminary results of this final
phase of the study were reported in June. Stay tuned - as another public meeting will be
held in the fall to report the conclusion of the project.
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Where
are the worst discharges? Visit our AMD page
stormwater
management | stream daylighting
| mine drainage | macro
& microbiology
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MACRO
& MICROBIOLOGY
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Fish Surveys
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The
health of a stream can be assessed by what organisms are living in it.
The
first fish survey on Chartiers Creek was conducted on the
section by the Idlewood Wetlands across from Rosslyn
Industrial Park in the summer of
1999. Aquatic life specialist Robert Ventorini, with
Civil and Environmental Consultants, Inc. used an
"electro fishing" device that allows collection
without killing.. Aided by volunteers, 97 fish were
caught and 17 species identified.
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"This
was quite surprising and encouraging," said
conservationist Mickey Bannon, one of the volunteers, who had
expected only four or five species. Ventorini said the wide
range of fish showed that the waterway was making a
comeback.
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The
largest sized fish were the carp (15") and a freshwater
drum (10"). About 600 feet of the creek was sampled over
a half hour. Of the 97 fish, 25% were the intermediate
pollution-tolerant emerald shiner, 18% were common carp, and
18% were greenside darter. A couple very young smallmouth
bass, which apparently had been reproduced naturally from
spawning, shows that the creek is indeed fishable for sport
catch and return. |
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Three
fish species cannot tolerate pollution and two of these
species had more than one catch: 2 longnose dace, 5 northern
hogsucker, and 1 banded darter. Nearly two-thirds of the fish
were "intermediate tolerant" while only a quarter of
the population (carp, chub, sucker, bluntnose minnow and
bullhead) could tolerate large amounts of pollution.
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The
latest fish survey was performed this past summer. How
does it compare to the first and subsequent surveys? Has
more aquatic habitat been created or have there been setbacks
since hurricane Ivan? Results are posted on the biology
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Macro-Invertebrate Surveys
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How healthy is the ecosystem of Chartiers Creek? Annual
macroinvertebrate surveys are performed by Washington & Jefferson
College biology students on Chartiers Creek in the upper watershed. .
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Fecal Coliform Water
Monitoring
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Chartiers
is a year-round
navigable waterway - a recreational creek that supports boating, fishing and
hiking. These activities pose the possibility of incidental contact
with the water - hands in the water, handling fish or wet gear,
accidental dunking or handling debris. Wading during the heat of
summer brings deliberate contact
and a greater risk of microbe ingestion.
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Sewage
in the water is the main deterrent to recreational boating in the lower Chartiers
Creek. For a couple years beginning in 2001, avid outdoorsman
John Hamm collected monthly
water samples from Chartiers Creek at the Chestnut Street Bridge (C35 ALCOSAN
outfall) in Carnegie and at the “little” Thornburg bridge (C20), just upstream from the “big” Thornburg Bridge/Rt
60. Occasional samples have also have taken from tributaries, storm drains and
other outfalls.
The samples
were tested by US Filter labs for fecal coliform
bacteria, which is a broad indicator of sewage presence, because it is
a bacteria found in the intestines of mammals. Yes, that includes dogs
and cats, raccoons and deer and turkey, humans and wildlife and people dumping pet duty.
The
standard which state and
health agencies use for issuing the wet weather river advisories for
recreational users of our large rivers, is usually 400 col/100ml
(colonies of fecal coliform per 100 milliliter).. This
applies to any undesignated swimming areas, such as Chartiers Creek and
Pittsburgh's three rivers. State Parks and regulated lakes and ponds designated for public
swimming use 200 col/100ml during the warm
season. Using the 400 standard, a quick check of the data
shows that half the time, coliform counts are above the standard,
regardless of high or low creek levels at the time any sample was
taken.
Publicizing fecal coliform testing
advises the public of health risks. The results have
generated increased awareness which has led to a successful lawsuit by
the Pennsylvania Environmental Defense Fund against local
municipalities with sanitary sewer outfalls (SSO's), requiring them to
clean up their act.
So how do you know when or not you should chance
exposure? If it has rained in the last couple of days and the water is
dirty-looking, then it is.
Country streams in the upper Chartiers watershed may not be much better after
a rain, especially if there
are some of those sited septic systems, 50% of which are not
effective or properly properly maintained. Not only do you have some illegal and
permitted sewage discharges after hard rains, you also have a
‘flushing’ of the landscape along with everything you can imagine that is
deposited on streets, parking lots, roofs, and woods and soil. Whether
it is water soluble or floats on top like engine oil, rain will carry it
in storm-sewers and gullies to the creek. The harder and longer the
rain is, the better the ‘flush’.
For
public health sake, we need to know and we need to advise others
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How
healthy is Chartiers Creek? Visit our
BIOLOGY page
stormwater
management | stream daylighting
| mine drainage | macro
& microbiology
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