Introduction to Brush Creek and the Brush Creek Watershed
Introduction to Brush Creek and the Brush Creek Watershed
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Objectives
I. The Brush Creek Watershed -- History and Present Conditions
Brush Creek begins in the city of Overland Park in northeastern Johnson County, Kansas, from where it flows in an northeasterly and easterly direction to its confluence with the Blue River in east-central Kansas City. In all, Brush Creek drains an area of nearly 80 square kilometers, of which slightly more than half is in the state of Missouri. The physical landscape of the Brush Creek watershed is characterized by gently rolling topography and a well integrated network of streams and valleys. Local relief in the watershed (that is, the depth of the valleys) is relatively low, ranging from approximately 10 meters along headwater valleys to 50 meters along the lower main valley of Brush Creek.
The Brush Creek watershed is completely urbanized, with land use dominated by single-family residential developments. Only a few areas of multiple-family dwellings exist. There are several small commercial districts scattered throughout the watershed, with the largest one extending northward from the Country Club Plaza (a world-famous retail district) to the watershed's northern edge. Two post-secondary educational institutions (the University of Missouri-Kansas City and Rockhurst College) are located in mid-basin approximately one-half of a kilometer to the southeast of the Plaza. A major art museum and sculpture garden (the Nelson-Atkins Museum) are located approximately half of a kilometer to the northeast of the Plaza. Much of the green space in the watershed is provided by golf courses, parks, and cemeteries, reflecting its urbanized nature. In addition, a considerable amount of green space is found along a few grand boulevards, which are a legacy of the City Beautiful movement in Kansas City of the early 1900s. The only significant indrustrialized part of the watersheds is found near the Brush Creek-Blue River confluence.
The channel of Brush Creek by and large reflects its urban setting. In its headwaters, the creek is not apparent at the surface because it is now carried beneath the surface in a large concrete storm sewer. Where it crosses from the city of Overland Park into the city of Prairie Village (in Johnson County, Kansas), the creek emerges from its underground conduit into an artificial open channel. All along its course through Prairie Village, Brush Creek flows in a channel that has a concrete floor and gabion banks (gabions are large steel mesh baskets that are filled with large rocks). When the creek leaves Prairie Village and flows into Mission Hills, Kansas, its channel becomes more natural with a bed of cobbles, gravel, sand, and some silt, and banks that are, in some places, vegetated .(although in many places the banks are artifical, composed large limestone blocks held together with mortar). The channel of Brush Creek stays more-or-less natural all the way through Missoin Hills and into Kansas City, for a distiance of about 600 meters beyond the state line. At that point, the channel's floor becomes paved and its banks become stabilized by stacked rock walls. This is the upstream end of a channel that was constructed in the mid 1930s and originally extended approximatley 6 kilometers downstream. This concrete-floored channel was one of several major Depression-era construction projects undertaken by the City. The ostensible purpose of the project was to improve sanitary conditions along the creek, which had become a series of stagnant polluted pools. But it also had to do with the desire of the city's political machine, run by Boss Tom Pendergast, to provide work for its constituents.
A noteworthy aspect of the urbanized watershed of Brush Creek is that nearly one-third of its entire area was developed by one person, J.C. Nichols, and the development company he founded. Nichols' first development began in 1905 just to the south of Brush Creek near the present-day location of the Country Club Plaza. From there, Nichols proceeded to develop land toward the south and west, working his way toward the headwaters of Brush Creek. By the mid-1960s, the J.C. Nichols Company had developed approximately 25 square kilometers of land, and had strongly influenced the development of much more that lay adjacent to it. For the most part, Nichols concentrated on laying out and building subdivisions for single family homes in an area he named the Country Club District (so called because his first developments were near the original Kansas City Country Club, which is now Loose Park). Nichols did, however, develop several shopping centers throughout the Country Club District as well. The most famous of these is the Country Club Plaza, which Nichols designed and built along Brush Creek in the 1920s as a major suburban retail district and gateway to the Country Club District.
The historian William Worley, in reference to the Country Club District, wrote that "there is literally no other contiguous development of this size by one developer in the United States." The extent of the Country Club District is, in fact, so great that, between the Plaza and its source in Johnson County, Brush Creek flows almost exclusively through Nichols-developed lands. Thus, the impacts (both direct and indirect) of this one developer on Brush Creek have been extensive.
All urban streams, like Brush Creek, can be dual-edged swords. Urban streams can, on the one hand, be regarded as benefits to an urban landscape. For instance, streams and associated riparian lands can be made into open corridors that create aesthetic diversity within the built environment of a city. Urban streams can also be utilized as the unifying focus of elongated parks or commons, supplying open space for urban residents. Urban streams can, on the one hand, be seen as hazards from which people and property need to be protected. The perception of streams as hazards largely derives from the fact that streams flood periodically, causing serious property damage and loss of life along developed urban flood plains. This preception is supported by the fact that urban streams tend to be very flood-prone. This is because, whenever it rains or whenever snow melts, little water soaks into the ground since much of the surface is covered by impervious materials -- streets, sidewalks, driveways, parking lots, roofs, trampled and compacted lawns. Unable to soak into the ground, rainwater and snowmelt flow (or run) quickly across the surface and through storm-sewer grates into storm sewers, which are nothing more than concrete-lined (and usually buried) tributaries to larger streams. Smooth concrete storm sewers then convey rainfall runoff or snowmelt quickly to these larger streams, causing them to fill rapidly with water. Every once in a while (such as during a heavy rain or a rapid snowmelt), urban streams will fill with more water than they can handle, and a flood (often a flash flood) results.
The perception of Brush Creek as a hazard received serious reinforcement in September of 1977. Prior to 1977, Brush Creek had experienced no major floods. Then, on September 12 and 13 of that year, the big one hit. In a 24-hour period, approximately 12 inches of rain fell on Kansas City, sending a virtual wall of water down Brush Creek. The greatest flooding was experienced downstream of the Kansas-Missouri state line, and every bridge (including the State Line bridge) was overtopped. Estimates of the recurrence interval of the flood downstream of State Line Road were between 200 and 500 years (which means that a flood of equal or greater size should occur, on average, only once every 200 to 500 years). The flood killed twelve people and caused enormous amounts of property damage. Estimates of damage caused by the flood were put at over $66 million (1978 dollars), of which more than 80 percent was incurred by shops in the Country Club Plaza. The flooding was so great that the Plaza shops located along Ward Parkway near Brush Creek were filled with water to depths of five to six feet. In addition, the flood rose so fast that people eating dinner in Plaza restaurants had to be rescued by human chains. Flooding also damaged businesses and residential areas in low-lying areas along the creek further downstream, although the monetary value of the damage in those areas was nowhere near as great as the damage that happened to the Plaza.
To get a better appreciation of the magnitude of the 1977 flood, take a look at the following slide show:
Slide
Show of the Brush Creek Flood of 1977
In October of 1998, heavy rain, as much as 7.7 inches in some areas, deluged streets and businesses, closed highways and knocked out power. Destruction was widespread. Southwest Boulevard was swamped by as much as 5 feet of water. Brush Creek, at the top of its banks, swept three cars off the Prospect Avenue bridge. Red Cross teams found waterlogged cars that had been tossed like toys, dozens of basements filled with water and many homes with structural damage, some with portions of their foundations washed away. Mayor Emanuel Cleaver estimated the damage in Kansas City to be in the millions. "The loss of life we take very seriously,'' Cleaver said at a news conference Monday afternoon. He said the city had documented at least two dozen successful rescues. The mayor also visited another hard-hit area, the Village Green Apartments, 1500 E. 46th St., near the Country Club Plaza. More than 100 units were damaged. Cars plastered with mud were stacked two and three deep. Cleaver said city officials would meet to discuss the possibility of applying for federal disaster aid. The flood claimed victims throughout the area, five of them at the Prospect Avenue bridge over Brush Creek. Authorities said the storm's intensity was second only to the flood of 1977, when up to 16 inches of rain fell on the area in a 24-hour period, sending Brush Creek out of its banks and inundating many Country Club Plaza businesses. Story taken from Kansas City Star article dated 10/06/98.
IV. Flood Control, Beautification, and Water Quality Concerns
In response to the flood of 1977, the Kansas City District of the U. S. Army Corps of Engineers conducted an in-depth flood control study, which resulted in recommendations to alter Brush Creek from Roanoke Parkway to Troost Avenue (a 2.25-kilometer length of channel) so that a similar catastrophe could be avoided in the future. The Corps did not recommend alterations for other sections of Brush Creek because, based on their analysis, the section between Roanoke Parkway and Troost was the only one where the potential monetary benefits (of avoiding future floods) outweighed the costs of modifying the channel (so that future floods would not occur). The Corps' recommendations, which were made to the U.S. Congress, were subsequently authorized for construction by the Federal Water Resources Development Act of 1986 (P. L. 99-662). The city of Kansas City was designated as the project's local sponsor, as required by law.
The Corps began design work for the authorized project in 1986. At the same time, Kansas City began developing a park and recreation improvement plan for Brush Creek and asked the Corps to incorporate its plan into the authorized flood control project. The Corps and city eventually reached an agreement on a combined Corps-City "flood control and beautification project" in 1990, for which the City authorized the expenditure of $50 million. The first stage of the project, which was completed in June of 1995, included several major features. For flood control, the channel was deepened significantly so that it could hold more runoff before it would spill over its banks. This necessitated the construction of a stair-step falls from the shallow upstream channel (the concrete-floored channel built during the Pendergast era in the 1930s) to the deepened downstream channel. For aesthetic enhancement, the channel was designed with irregular curving sides and with two low dams placed at intervals along the channel floor to create pools. (Without the dams the stream would contain very little water most of the time.) Also included in the project were walkways along the pools. These were included as a small but integral part of the city's evolving plans to make Brush Creek into a "cultural corridor" that will extend from west to east across the center of the city. Kansas City wants to use Brush Creek much as San Antonio, Texas, has used the Trinity River: as a means of drawing people together where they can relax, walk, and mingle along a corridor having ready access to a variety of cultural resources.
Another aspect of the flood-control and beautification project worth noting are the several fountains that have been placed within and alongside the pools. One purpose of these fountains is to help enhance the aesthetics of the newly-created pools. But their more important purpose is to help maintain and improve the quality of the water along this section of Brush Creek. The fountains are part of a large recirculating system that is driven by large impeller pumps that are located beneath the bed of the channel. This recirculating system is designed to keep the water in the pools from becoming stagnant and to help aerate the water so that it will meet water quality standards specified by the U.S. Environmental Protection Agency. This recirculating system is, therefore, a very important part of the overall project -- since poor water quality is a major concern regarding the future prospects of the newly beautified stream.
Why is poor water quality a concern along Brush Creek? For one, it's a concern because of the creek's urban setting. Whenever it rains or whenever snow melts in an urban watershed, water running off across impervious surfaces picks up all sorts of polluting substances -- stuff like spilled gasoline and oil, litter, animal droppings, fertilizers, pesticides. It then carries these pollutants to storm sewers, and through storm sewers to larger streams (such as Brush Creek). Thus, whenever much rain falls or snow melts and water runs off from its watershed, Brush Creek receives a slug of nonpoint source pollution -- pollution that comes from all over its watershed and not from one single specific source. (Streams also often receive point source pollution -- pollution that comes from a single definite source, such as a factory. However, nonpoint source pollution is typically a bigger problem than point source pollution in many watersheds.)
A second reason why poor water quality is a major concern along Brush Creek has to do with the fact that several combined sewers empty into Brush Creek from the Kansas state line to its mouth. These sewers, which are common in large cities that were constructed before World War II, are designed to carry wastewater (everything from raw sewage to shower and sink water) and stormwater (rainfall runoff or snow melt). Normally, wastewater -- and stormwater when there is stormwater -- are carried by combined sewers to the city's wastewater treatment plant. However, whenever a lot of runoff flows into the combined sewer system (because of an intense rain or rapid snowmelt), the wastewater treatment plant could become overtaxed by all the water. Therefore, to avoid this, the sewers are designed to discharge some water (a combination of stormwater and wastewater) directly into the creek whenever there is excessive rainfall runoff or snowmelt. In other words, the system is designed so that Brush Creek will receive raw sewage every once in a while, though any sewage it receives should be highly diluted by lots of stromwater. Yet, shortly after the pools along the reach of the flood-control and beautification project were filled in the summer of 1995, it became clear that dry-weather discharges of sewage were flowing into Brush Creek . The city found this out by monitoring levels of fecal coliform in the creek, as reported in several articles in the Kansas City Star newspaper during the months of August and September of 1996. Though coliform levels fluctuated wildly, some measurements indicated that levels at times were 10 to 15 times greater than the maximum recommended level specified by the U. S. Environmental Protection Agency. The creek quickly became dubbed "Flush Creek." Faced with a public relations disaster on a project for which it had allocated $50 million, the city quickly undertook an intensive inspection and maintenance program and has implemented a variety of measures to rectify the problem. According to reports in the Kansas City Star, it appears that the steps taken so far -- including more frequent maintenance of the combined sewers to ensure that they operate properly -- are working. High coliform levels during times of dry weather have not been a problem since the fall of 1996.
The city plans to continue modifying Brush Creek for purposes of flood-control and beautification downstream from Troost Avenue, alhough this extends beyond the boundary of the project that was authorized by the Federal government. Some of this work has alreacy been accomplished and some is presently being done. For example, just downstream from Elmwood Avenue near the confluence of Brush Creek and the Blue River, the City constructed a 5-meter high dam in 1995, which created a lake (called Lake 8) that extends up Brush Creek for more than a kilometer. The City has done an extensive amount of landscaping around Lake 8 in an effort to turn the area into an attractive linear park. In addition, the City recently began a project to straighten and deepen Brush Creek where it is crossed by the Paseo. Up until now, Brush Creek at the Paseo made two right angle bends, which during times of high flows caused water to back up and sometimes spill out of the channel. Straightening and deepening the channel will help to keep this from happening in the future, and thus reduce the flood hazard along this reach of the stream. The City also intends to beautify the new channel around the Paseo in a fashion similar to what was done further upstream. Therefore, protecting and improving the water quality of Brush Creek will only grow as a concern as the City continues to put much effort into tapping Brush Creek as an asset to the urban landscape.
To learn more about Brush Creek and its watershed, take the following virtual fieldtrip:
Virtual Fieldtrip of Brush Creek
Do Exercise A
Since water quality is very dependent on the local conditions of the stream, the visual survey should be completed in the immediate vicinity of each monitoring site that will be used for sampling. The site is generally a 300-foot long section of stream that contains at least one riffle area. Surveys should extend up any tributaries that enter the stream in this area. Important criteria for selecting sites are that they should have adequate access and be typical of the entire stream segment that is being monitored. The locations of these sites should be considered permanent to allow the group to develop several years of data at the same location. This would produce enough data so trends can begin to be seen beyond the normal variability of the data. Visual survey of monitoring sites should be conducted twice per year, once with foliage present (spring/summer) and once with the foliage absent (fall/winter).
The following checklist is to be followed when collecting information during a visual survey at a field site, and all the checklist items should be filled out on the appropriate form. Read through the checklist and then do Exercise B.
2. LOCATION. The location requested here is the location of the 100-300' stream section being monitored. Include the SITE NUMBER you designate, which becomes very important if you choose to monitor more than one site. Record the legal description if you can read it from the topographic map or have received that information from program personnel. The DESCRIPTION refers to a verbal description. Examples of descriptions would be "Bruener's Ford" or "50 feet upstream of the Highway N bridge."
3. DATE, TIME (Please use military time; e.g., 2:00 PM is 14:00), and TRAINED VOLUNTEER NAME. Record the name of the TOPOGRAPHIC QUADRANGLE MAP that includes your monitoring site. Record the Legal description and UTM coordinates. A listing of PARTICIPANTS is most useful if you monitor with other trained volunteers. It is also helpful if students or participants in a youth group perform the analyses. This allows program staff to ascertain exactly who conducted the monitoring, should questions arise.
4. WEATHER. Check the appropriate description from the choices provided.
5. RAINFALL for the previous week. Possibilities for obtaining this information is to maintain a rain gauge near the site; contacting the National Weather Service or the local wastewater treatment plant; recording information from local weather broadcasts.
6. FLOODPLAIN LAND USE. List the dominant land uses in the flood plain. Estimate percentages using:
10. BOTTOM DEPOSITS. Estimate what percent of the stream bottom is covered by:
12. ALGAE. Estimate the percent of the stream bottom covered by visible algae.
Of the total algal cover, what percent is:
14. WATER ODOR. If any odor is present, please describe.
15. OTHER COMMENTS. May include the presence of drainpipes, ditches and other water conveyances. Any other observations you think are important.
The Volunteer Monitoring Program uses four site identification methods (Reproduced from the "Volunteer Water Quality Monitoring Program", Chapter 7, pages 1-3):
1. SITE NUMBERS METHOD
Example: Site #1
Label each site that you monitor with a number, beginning with #1. Continue to use that number for that site every time you submit data. If you abandon a monitoring site, do not transfer that site's number to the next place you choose to monitor. Your next site would be given a new number that is specific to that place, for instance site #2. If you routinely monitor two sites, even if they are on different streams, one site should be labeled Site #1 and the other should be labeled Site #2. This information and the next three methods for site identification are very important for tracking your data in agency files.
2. VERBAL DESCRIPTION
Example: Upstream from HWY 63 bridge
Describe where you are on a stream using street or highway names, bridge numbers, approximate distances from landmarks, etc. Continue to use the same verbal description of your site each time you submit data.
2. LEGAL DESCRIPTION METHOD
Example: NW ¼, NE ¼, SE ¼, SEC 12, T46N, R2W
Determine the legal description for each site and record this information on the data sheets each time you submit data. Send a photocopy of a map with the site(s) clearly marked. Include the county name and map name on the photocopy.
Township (2 different meanings in the land office grid system)
A township is a six-mile by six-mile square plot of land.
Township is a six-mile unit of measure north or south of a base line.
Base line: A selected parallel of latitude used as a starting line for township north/south designation.
Range: A six-mile unit of measure east or west of a principle meridian.
Principle meridian: A selected line of longitude used as a starting line for range east/west designation.
Section: A one-mile by one-mile square area of land within a township. There are 36 sections in a township.
Hints for determining legal descriptions:
Township designations are located on the east and west edges of the map.
Range designations are located on the north and south edges of the map.
Section numbers are usually printed in the center of each section.
Sections are numbered 1 through 36, starting in the upper right hand corner of the township.
All three (Township, Range, and Section) are usually printed in red ink.
Compass directional quarters (NW, NE, SE, and SW) are determined by dividing the sections into smaller and smaller quarters. When recording a legal description from left to right, the smallest directional quarter determined is the first one listed, followed by the larger quarters, the section, township, and range respectively.
Do Exercise B