Little Menomonee River Corridor Ecosystem Restoration
PRESENTER: Andrew Struck, Ozaukee County
The Ozaukee County Planning and Parks Department is implementing a large scale habitat restoration project on the Little Menomonee River (LMR) in the City of Mequon, Ozaukee County. Project goals for the LMR include: (1) improve water quality and document water quality impacts; (2) improve geomorphic function; (3) provide high quality, diverse habitat; and (4) demonstrate successful use of a GIS Tool.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Port Milwaukee Green Visioning
PRESENTER: Amy Post, Symbiont
Our region’s aqueous gateway, Port Milwaukee’s Jones Island operations include massive docks, cranes, railways, salt piles, and the Lake Express ferry. Harbor District Inc. (HDI)’s innovative planning illustrates how, with green infrastructure and other creative storm water solutions, Port Milwaukee can exceed water quality standards and inspire the public. Using Wisconsin Coastal Management Program Grant funding, HDI worked with Symbiont to develop conceptual stormwater designs for three Jones Island sites.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Serve the Community Inspire the World: Chicago’s South Lakefront Framework Plan
PRESENTERS : Gregg Calpino and Valerie Berstene, Smith Group Heather Gleason, Chicago Park District
The South Lakefront Framework Plan sets a community-based course for the evolution of Chicago’s historic Jackson Park and South Shore Cultural Center. Community concerns of gentrification and displacement charged this plan to deliver a vision and tools for a larger, more connected park. Centered around a water-forward strategy, the plan repositions the park’s lagoons and lakes as central, usable and unifying elements while bolstering their role as a sustainable, performance landscape.
Streambank Stabilization and Restoration in an Urban Watershed
PRESENTER: Terrence Tavera, Ruekert & Mielke
Decades worth of urbanized runoff had turned a once wild natural creek to a system that experienced severe flooding, erosion and habitat degradation. The City of Greenfield recently completed their latest phase of a multi-year plan to restore Wildcat Creek. Public/private partnerships needed to overcome project hurdles was discussed along with funding sources utilized. A restored concrete lined channel on Beaver Creek in the Village of Brown Deer was also highlighted.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
STEAM - Art Bringing Life to Water Across the Curriculum
PRESENTERS: Christine Fleming, The Haggerty Museum of Art
Dr. Jeanne Hewitt, UW-Milwaukee Children’s Environmental Health Science Center
Where are the arts in our Milwaukee water science community? Christine Fleming discussed how an art museum brought life to a water curriculum by allowing art to act as a catalyst for ecoliteracy and inspiration.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
MMSD 2050 Facilities Plan Update
PRESENTER: Karen Sands, MMSD
During this sessions Karen Sands discussed what MMSD is planning for the future of our region. The 2050 Facilities Plan addresses future visions and timelines:
How the region will reach the MMSD 2035 Vision
What is necessary for MMSD to accomplish regulatory outcomes for 2040
How MMSD will achieve its mission and more when the region is fully built out
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Water Stewardship at Clear Water Farms
PRESENTER: Bill Davis, River Alliance of Wisconsin
The Clear Water Farms program guides farms and processing facilities through a rigorous certification of their on-site and supply chain water management using the Alliance for Water Stewardship International Water Stewardship Standard—the world’s only comprehensive industry water use standard. Meeting the standard can reduce a farm’s costs, resource and regulatory risks, and demonstrates commitment to consumers who value sustainable food production.
Clear Water Farms produced the first certification of a farm in North America in the fall of 2019, and is currently scaling the project with the aim of including more than 10 farms within a watershed. Learn more about the Miltrim Farms success story and other program details in this session.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Mapping Lake Sturgeon Habitat in the Milwaukee River Using Side-Scan Sonar
PRESENTER: Ryan Miller, Ozaukee County
Since 2006, approximately 11,000 Lake Sturgeon have been released into the Milwaukee River and are expected to begin returning within the next few years to spawn. However, it is unknown if there is sufficient accessible spawning habitat. Ozaukee County is currently using side-scan sonar as a low-cost method to evaluate over 14 miles of the Milwaukee River. The generated habitat maps will provide the information needed to consider potential Lake Sturgeon habitat restoration projects.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Greenspace as a Community Asset: The Kinnickinnic River Plaza
PRESENTERS: Kelly Moore Brands and Stephanie Mercado, Sixteenth Street Community Health Centers
The revitalization of the Kinnickinnic River directly affects residents in Milwaukee’s Kinnickinnic River Corridor Neighborhood. The removal of houses to make way for the river’s new widened floodplain left grassy lots and dead-end alleys and streets that brought suspicious activity. Sixteenth Street Community Health Centers and its many partners used this as an opportunity to engage with neighbors to create a useful, educational, fun, and unique greenspace adjacent to a popular county park.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
GI Maintenance Analysis and Lessons Learned
PRESENTERS: Lisa Sasso, MMSD
Alyssa Schmitt, Stormwater Solutions Engineering
While more and more municipalities seek to scale up green infrastructure (GI) in their communities to address their storm sewer permit requirements as well as their flood protection and water quality improvement goals, they’re concerned about the associated long-term operations and maintenance costs and staffing issues that come with GI solutions. The Milwaukee Metropolitan Sewerage District (District) contracted with Stormwater Solutions Engineering, LLC (SSE) to develop GI maintenance standards for bioswales, green roofs, rain gardens, porous pavement, constructed wetlands, stormwater trees, cisterns, native landscaping and soil amendments.
The SSE team was also tasked with interviewing DPW and engineering staff at 21 municipalities in the District’s service area to better understand their GI maintenance needs, lessons learned, and synthesizing the information to make recommendations for improving process efficiencies and GI effectiveness in future GI projects.
The project is seen as an opportunity to enhance GI installations and secure better long-term O&M plans. In this session, we shared a brief overview of the GI maintenance standards that were developed as well as the municipal lessons learned.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Q&As for the Milwaukee River Basin TMDL
PRESENTERS: Samantha Katt, Mark Riedel, and Jake Zimmerman, WDNR
Staff from the Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources gave brief presentations/overviews on regulation and water quality in southeastern Wisconsin, the Milwaukee River Basin bacteria TMDL, and TMDL implementation experiences from the Rock River.
Check out Jake Zimmerman’s presentation visuals here and Samantha Katt’s presentation visuals here.
Regenerative Stormwater Conveyance at CTH KR Roadway Expansion: Economics and Environment Can Both Win
PRESENTERS: Adrienne Cizek, Stormwater Solutions Engineering Dave Giordano, Root Pike WIN
Wisconsin Department of Transportation (WisDOT) is expanding County Highway KR and must manage additional stormwater flows associated with the added pavement, what would conventionally be managed in a stormwater pond adjacent to the Pike River. Stakeholder groups, including Kenosha County, Root-Pike Watershed Initiative Network (RPWIN), Wisconsin Department of Natural Resources (WDNR), and WisDOT agreed that Regenerative Stormwater Conveyance was an alternative innovative solution which improved the ecology of the Pike River, potential recreational and development uses, water quality improvements, and overall economics to manage the additional runoff.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Annual Report Summary of Southeast Region MS4s
PRESENTER: Suzy Limberg, WDNR
This presentation provided an analysis of southeast region’s MS4’s 2018 annual report data, discussing common themes, and what it means for permittees moving forward in annual reporting and the MS4 program as a whole. A brief overview of the reissued MS4 general permit and upcoming compliance dates was also presented.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Growing Small Green (Infrastructure) Dreams into a Big Reality at Alice’s Garden
PRESENTER: Janee Pederson, GZA
Margaret Swedish, Alice’s Garden
Alice’s Garden sought to create a sustainable irrigation system for their community garden. Working for and with local non-profits, GZA designed a solar-powered, rainwater harvesting system and helped construct it alongside volunteers to meet this need. The system uses stormwater runoff, diverted from the adjacent schoolyard, to irrigate edible crops. A graduate student conducted a water quality risk assessment to affirm the treatment system would sufficiently mitigate human contact with pollutants common in urban stormwater runoff.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Milwaukee River Watershed Clean Farm Families
PRESENTER: Jim Melichar, President
The Milwaukee River Watershed Clean Farm Families, working as part of the Milwaukee River Watershed Conservation Partnership, is providing a platform for producers and landowners to share ideas, concerns, priorities, and lessons learned about agricultural conservation efforts within the Milwaukee River Watershed.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Utilizing GIS-based mobile tools to support conservation planning and implementation for Adaptive Management
PRESENTER: Megan Bender, Jacobs
Mobile tools assist with organizing and deploying field teams to collect information and facilitate communication between program team members. NEW Water’s Adaptive Management Plan in the Ashwaubenon and Dutchman Creeks watersheds will utilize ArcGIS Collector, automated email reports, and web-based dashboards to identify, plan, implement, and maintain agricultural best management practices to reduce phosphorus and suspended solids delivery to waterways.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Engaging Challenged Communities
PRESENTERS: Delores Green, Renew Environmental Public Health Advocates Dr. Jeanne Hewitt, UW-Milwaukee Children’s Environmental Health Science Center
Engaging socio-economically challenged communities is vital to real environmental and social change. Why is it that so many communities of color are not engaged? This is a question we must all address.
Check out the presentation visuals here.
Going Green Saves Green - Reducing Operating Costs and Increasing Profits With Sustainable Designs
PRESENTER: John Ferris, GZA
Too often the decision for installing green infrastructure emphasizes holistic social and environmental benefits of the Triple Bottom Line. However, an even stronger case may be made for the economic business case for going green. Several examples and case studies were presented to illustrate how green decisions can improve the financial longevity of the business.
Check out the presentation visuals here.