“Save Reedy Creek!” Andrew or Parr yells out once again in class after Todd mentions it. I don’t particularly know much about Reedy Creek, much less why we have to save it. It seems like more of a “I’ll cross that bridge when I get there” sort of thing anyway.
One of the yard signs we saw on the way there.
I get to that bridge at 8am on a thursday morning while eating yogurt out of coffee mug riding along in a university van. Barely keeping my eyes open, we pass house after house with yard signs stating “Reedy Creek “Restoration”” with a big red X through the words. Obviously people are invested in their Reedy Creek, but I still don’t know why.
We jump out of the vans at the end of a cul de sac and find Rachel, Andrew, and a man who introduces himself as Bill Shanabruch. Bill has on a nifty tree identification tshirt and leads us on a jaunt through the woods to a beautiful clearing containing part of the infamous Reedy Creek.
Bill starts a passionate rant about how the local government has the money to put a concrete channel into Reedy Creek that will fix some short term issues, but create more long term ones with erosion, sediment displacement, wildlife, etc. The government thinks that if they have the money to do it, then it should happen. There have been many city council meetings where advocates for Reedy Creek have talked about the detrimental effects that the “restoration” will cause. The response was essentially, “just trust us.” For an environmentally conscious populus, it isn’t quite that simple. There is a lack of data collected on the restoration site, the restoration will destroy park property and the tree canopy, and there will be a permanent loss of historical resources. Additionally, projects similar to this one have seen poor maintenance after the project is completed. We should focus on the root (fun pun) causes of stream degradation first to stop the problem rather than temporarily fixing the result.
On a different note, Bill talked a bit about the upcoming election; all but one of the candidates for city council are against the restoration. I registered to vote in Virginia, so I’m pretty stoked to exercise my right to vote for one of those candidates and do my part to help Save Reedy Creek.
The current condition of Reedy Creek in all of its splendor