streams
Stream Management Program

Program Summary

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DEP works with watershed communities and landowners to address chronic and pervasive problems of Catskill Mountain streams, which are the source of 90% of the City’s water supply. These issues include streambank and bed erosion, compromised water quality, flood hazard risks and fisheries habitat degradation. The catastrophic floods of January 1996, clearly demonstrated that the traditional approach of repairing isolated streambanks doesn’t effectively address the real causes of stream instability.

The City has committed nearly $31 million to stream management in the Catskill/Delaware watershed. DEP and its partnering agencies have also secured more than $5 million from the US Army Corps of Engineers, the New York State Department of Environmental Conservation, the US Environmental Protection Administration, the Federal Emergency Management Administration, the Catskill Watershed Corporation and Trout Unlimited.

DEP’s program works to restore stream system stability and ecological integrity by:

• approaching stream management across watershed stream sub-basins, rather than at isolated erosion sites
• integrating multiple objectives, like minimizing flood hazards, increasing fish habitat and improving water quality;
• involving local communities, organizations and affected landowners
• using the science of river physical processes, called fluvial geomorphology, [link to definition of the geomorphic approach] as the basis for management recommendations.

Streams have historically been managed by landowners and multiple layers of governmental agencies, each with their own objectives and practices. Developing a stream management plan [link to “Stream Planning Process”] is a collaborative process among DEP, the local Soil and Water Conservation District (SWCD) and property owners. Together, they examine the stream from many different perspectives –– as part of a stormwater transport system; as a fishery and recreational resource; as a prospective threat to private property, bridges, roads and culverts from flooding and streambank erosion; and as a source of drinking water for New York City and four upstate counties.

Program Accomplishments

Since 1995, DEP has contracted with the county Soil and Water Conservation Districts to develop management plans, restoration and protection projects in priority watershed sub-basins [link to stream management projects]. To develop a more informed constituency of regional stream managers and community participants, DEP and its partners have conducted a number of education and training programs. Technical stream databases have been developed to provide vital support for stream management decisions, design specifications and program evaluation. To help collect data and do other program work, DEP has hired AmeriCorps participants as well as community college summer field crews.

Throughout the Catskill/Delaware watershed, stream management plans for sub-basins are in some phase of development. A final plan has been completed for the Broadstreet Hollow, a tributary of the Esopus Creek, and a draft plan made for the Batavia Kill, a tributary of Schoharie Creek. Plans are under development for additional streams, including the West Branch Delaware River, supplying the Cannonsville Reservoir; the Stony Clove Creek, an Esopus Creek tributary; the West Kill, a tributary of the Schoharie Creek; and the Chestnut Creek, supplying the Rondout Reservoir. Additional plans for the Esopus Creek, East Branch Delaware River and Schoharie Creek are expected.

Stream restoration and protection projects offer vivid demonstrations of the principles of the geomorphic approach as well as securing public awareness and interest and providing local teaching tools. The first project in a sub-basin is often selected on the basis of the severity of the problem in addition to its visibility and its accessibility. Each of the five projects constructed to date have been in Greene County. They’ve been specifically designed and built to address excessive erosion in a clay-rich valley setting, which has caused high levels of turbidity -- an important water quality concern. Future projects may also work to protect highly stable and healthy stream segments and to establish riparian (stream-associated) vegetation along the stream, called a stream buffer. Vigorous stream buffers are critical to a stream’s biological and physical condition.

Under the Filtration Avoidance Determination, DEP is required to develop a Program Evaluation Strategy and provide biannual evaluations. As part of this process, DEP has convened an Advisory Committee, which met in May and December of 2002.

Additional Information

For more information about the Stream Management Program, please read: Optimizing Catskill Mountain Regional Bankfull Discharge and Hydraulic Geometry Relationships

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