WALLER CREEK STATUS REPORT 2002

This short report contains information on Waller Creek's estimated population, fecal coliform levels, land use distribution, mean baseflow, total phosphorus, and other water quality indicators.Water chemistry and biological data from Waller Creek were reviewed in order to evaluate temporal and spatial trends on this urban stream. The results of site analysis of variance indicated little discernable difference among sites and variability was high for conventional water chemistry constituents. Temporal trends were inconsistent with no notable degradation or improvements. Benthic macroinvertebrate surveys showed some significant site differences that appear to relate primarily to flow and possibly to nutrient enrichment. These surveys documented decreasing water quality over time; however, this result is apparently an artifact of the final survey, which took place after a long dry period. Overall, Waller Creek has low water quality and biological integrity when compared to other Austin area streams (worse than 75 percent of the watersheds for most measures).Waller Creek Working Grou

The Flow Permanence Index: A Statistical Assessment of Flow Regime in Austin Streams

The report makes two explicit mentions of Waller Creek, briefly mentioning flow patterns and how they are highest near its mouth. In addition, the report contains valuable information concerning the importance of baseflow in the sustainability of a creek ecosystem.Flow permanence or the reliability of baseflow in a stream is an important metric in determining the potential of local streams to support aquatic life and can be used to provide an indication of future ecological changes. This report looks at quantifying the probabilities associated with permanent flow at all streams monitored for the City of Austin Environmental Integrity Index. Spatial patterns in flow permanence were examined, as well as the contributions of rainfall to flow permanence. Among the principal results is an index and ranking of streams with the most and least consistently flowing monitoring sites and a heuristic to calculate the probability of flow in a stream given the cumulative rainfall in the previous three months.Waller Creek Working Grou

Waller Creek: A very urban stream

Waller Creek Working Grou

The 303(d) Assessment Process and Water Quality Impairments in Austin

This presentation describes the assessment process and water quality impairments in Austin under the Federal Clean Water Act.Waller Creek Working Grou

Riparian reference condition: Using regional plant composition to guide functional improvements in the City of Austin

This technical report focuses on ways to restore riparian habitat within specific Austin creeks. This study is designed to serve as a template for restoration efforts with other urbanized creeks (Waller).As a result of an expanding and rapidly urbanizing metropolitan area, the riparian vegetation communities of Austin-area streams continue to diverge further from their natural state. In an effort to maintain the ecological function and the natural character of Austin watersheds, the City of Austin Watershed Protection Department has identified a need to characterize an archetype, or background condition of Edwards Plateau and Blackland Prairie riparian communities for use as a template for both benchmarking and target for stream restoration projects. Species composition, spatial arrangement and physical attributes of vegetation communities for 12 sites located in both smaller and larger watersheds were characterized using multiple belt-transects. Multivariate analyses including detrended correspondence analysis (DCA), analysis of similarity (ANOSIM), and similarity percentage (SIMPER) were performed by Community Analysis Package software (Seaby and Henderson 2007). Results show that there was a significant difference in plant community composition in all compared drainage areas and ecoregions for both ground cover and overstory communities (p<0.05). The analysis of similarity showed that the samples should be grouped by ecoregion and location within the watershed for overstory and ground cover communities. Recommended vegetation templates are presented as a guide for comparison to other riparian communities in the Austin area, and also a reference point for restoration of degraded systems. These quantitative species distribution lists are an important resource for riparian ecologists in this region.Waller Creek Working Grou

Community-powered urban stream restoration: A vision for sustainable and resilient urban ecosystems

Urban streams can provide amenities to people living in cities, but those benefits are reduced when streams become degraded, potentially even causing harm (disease, toxic compounds, etc.). Governments and institutions invest resources to improve the values and services provided by urban streams; however, the conception, development, and implementation of such projects may not include meaningful involvement of community members and other stakeholders. Consequently, project objectives may be misaligned with community desires and needs, and projects may fail to achieve their goals. In February 2020, the 5(th) Symposium on Urbanization and Stream Ecology, an interdisciplinary meeting held every 3 to 5 y, met in Austin, Texas, USA, to explore new approaches to urban stream projects, including ways to maximize the full range of potential benefits by better integrating community members into project identification and decision making. The symposium included in-depth discussion about 4 nearby field case studies, participation of multidisciplinary urban stream experts from 5 continents, and input from the Austin community. Institutional barriers to community inclusion were identified and analyzed using real-world examples, both from the case studies and from the literature, which clarified disparities in power, equity, and values. Outcomes of the symposium have been aggregated into a vision that challenges the present institutional approach to urban stream management and a set of strategies to systematically address these barriers to improve restoration solutions. Integrating community members and other stakeholders throughout the urban restoration process, and a transparent decision-making process to resolve divergent objectives, can help identify appropriate goals for realizing both the ecological and social benefits of stream restoration

Community-powered urban stream restoration: A vision for sustainable and resilient urban ecosystems

Este artículo contiene 16 páginas, 2 tablas, 3 figuras.Urban streams can provide amenities to people living in cities, but those benefits are reduced when streams become degraded, potentially even causing harm (disease, toxic compounds, etc.). Governments and institutions invest resources to improve the values and services provided by urban streams; however, the conception, development, and implementation of such projects may not include meaningful involvement of community members and other stakeholders. Consequently, project objectives may be misaligned with community desires and needs, and projects may fail to achieve their goals. In February 2020, the 5th Symposium on Urbanization and Stream Ecology, an interdisciplinary meeting held every 3 to 5 y, met in Austin, Texas, USA, to explore new approaches to urban stream projects, including ways to maximize the full range of potential benefits by better integrating community members into project identification and decision making. The symposium included in-depth discussion about 4 nearby field case studies, participation of multidisciplinary urban stream experts from 5 continents, and input from the Austin community. Institutional barriers to community inclusion were identified and analyzed using real-world examples, both from the case studies and from the literature, which clarified disparities in power, equity, and values. Outcomes of the symposium have been aggregated into a vision that challenges the present institutional approach to urban stream management and a set of strategies to systematically address these barriers to improve restoration solutions. Integrating community members and other stakeholders throughout the urban restoration process, and a transparent decision-making process to resolve divergent objectives, can help identify appropriate goals for realizing both the ecological and social benefits of stream restoration.Publication costs were covered by an award from the Society of Freshwater Science’s Endowed Publication Fund (https:// freshwater-science.org/publications/endowed-publication-fund).Peer reviewe

Reclaimed water irrigation water quality impact assessment, Phase 1 Summary of Results

This report presents the results of a water quality study conducted on Waller Creek at 45th and 38th street.Waller Creek Working Grou

STRUCTURAL AND NON-STRUCTURAL BMPS FOR PROTECTING STREAMS

Stream ecosystems in three different locations in the United States were found to benefit in a similar fashion from retention of watershed forest and wetland cover and wide, continuous riparian buffers with mature, native vegetation. The findings can help guide comprehensive watershed management and application of these non-structural practices in low-impact urban design. Intensive study of structural best management practices (BMPs) in one location found that, even with a relatively high level of attention, a minority of the developed area is served by these BMPs. Those BMPs installed are capable of mitigating an even smaller share of urban impacts, primarily because of inadequacies in design standards. Even with these shortcomings, though, results showed that structural BMPs help to sustain aquatic biological communities, especially at moderately high urbanization levels, where space limits non-structural options