Scheduled River Improvements in San Antonio

The historic San Antonio River has long served as the heart of the city. Each year the world-renowned River Walk draws millions of visitors, yet miles of urban river with untapped potential lie beyond downtown and the famed Paseo del Rio. A comprehensive, multi-year project is underway to restore and enhance 13 miles of the San Antonio River both north and south of downtown.

The San Antonio River Improvements Project (SARIP) is a $384.5 million on-going investment by the City of San Antonio, Bexar County, San Antonio River Authority (SARA), the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) and the San Antonio River Foundation in flood control, amenities, ecosystem restoration and recreational improvements along 13 miles of the San Antonio River from Hildebrand Avenue south to Loop 410 South. Throughout the project, SARA will provide project and technical management, as well as overall project coordination between the project partners. SARA will also conduct on-going operation and maintenance activities when the project is completed.

SARIP is comprised of four distinctive reaches: The Museum Reach, a four-mile segment of the river from Hildebrand Avenue south to Lexington Avenue; the Downtown Reach, a segment of the original River Walk from Lexington Avenue to Houston Street; the Eagleland, a one-mile segment from South Alamo to Lonestar Boulevard; and the Mission Reach, a eight-mile section of the river extending from Lonestar Boulevard south to Loop 410 South.

A concerted community effort to revitalize the river began in 1998 when Bexar County, the City of San Antonio and SARA created the San Antonio River Oversight Committee. The 22 civic and neighborhood leaders appointed to the committee were given the responsibility of overseeing the planning, design, project management, construction and funding necessary to complete the project. In addition, the committee was charged with providing an open public forum for citizen input into the project's development. The Oversight Committee meets monthly and is co-chaired by former mayor Lila Cockrell and architect Irby Hightower.

http://www.sanantonioriver.org/

LA's methodology for similar project

LA did a similar project and there's a pretty thorough user guide online at http://www.labmpmethod.org/.  I think it will be very useful as we develop something like this ourselves.  Their approach was:

1. Prioritize catchments based on need (i.e., pollutant-loading, receiving water issues, etc.);
2. Identify potential BMPs opportunities within high priority catchments (based on factors such as land ownership, etc.);
3. Identify appropriate BMPs (based on factors such as cost, maintenance, effectiveness, etc.); and
4. Develop site-specific implementation strategies (based on site-specific evaluations).

Some questions I have:

• are we focusing on wet weather only or including dry weather?
• what pollutants?  bateria?  metals?  trash?
• what pollution data can we get?

Map Server

This is the City of San Antonio's Map server. They are using Flex Viewer which serves up ArcMap files.

San Antonio Map

And here are pre-made maps of San Antonio

Maps

"Site fingerprinting"

Yesterday Lee-Anne mentioned "site fingerprinting" and I wasn't really sure what that was so I looked it up. Here's what I found. I'm not really sure how this is different than a site analysis that includes environmental considerations...

 

1.1 What is Site Fingerprinting?

 

Site fingerprinting is a planning tool used to design communities where protection of natural resources is the primary focus. This process enables the user to view, identify, and analyze the natural, built, economic, and social aspects of a prospective site. Site fingerprinting has five key objectives:

• Identify general site features,
• Determine and locate primary and secondary conservation areas,
• Consider the impact of other important factors such as adjacent land uses, accessibility, transportation and infrastructure availability,
• Use collected information to derive the actual buildable area, and
• Synthesize this information to create various development scenarios which incorporate the natural features of the site."Synthesize this information to create various development scenarios which incorporate the natural features of the site."

 

 

http://crd.dnr.state.ga.us/content/displaycontent.asp?txtDocument=969

 

San Antonio neighborhood tours

http://www.saculturaltours.com/

Online tours + maps of San Antonio done by city's Office of Cultural Affairs.

Westside
Downtown/ North river
Eastside

Edwards Aquifer Protection Program

http://www.tceq.state.tx.us/compliance/field_ops/eapp/program.html

"Anyone who plans to build on the recharge, transition, or contributing zones of the Edwards Aquifer must first have an application including construction plans approved by the TCEQ. Personnel from the Edwards Aquifer Protection Program review these plans. If a plan is approved, the site is monitored for compliance."

Includes spreadsheet to calculate TSS.  Might be useful for quantifying advantages of our proposals?  Or sizing BMPs in our designs?

2007 Texas State Water Plan

2007 Texas State Water Plan
http://www.twdb.state.tx.us/wrpi/swp/swp.asp


Has some really good background info on Texas climate, water, etc.


@Chapter 2 (Regional Summaries) provides graphics, tables, and text summarizing results for each planning area.

@ Chapter 3 (Fifty Years of Water Planning in Texas) presents the general history of state water planning in Texas, including how water management strategies and the planning process have evolved over the past 50 years, and discusses the implementation status of water management strategies recommended in the 2002 State Water Plan.

@ Chapter 4 (Population and Water Demand Projections) summarizes the methodology and results for population and water demand projections, including discussions of how different economic sectors use water.

@ Chapter 5 (Climate of Texas) discusses the climate of Texas, including general rainfall patterns and information on the frequency and magnitude of drought in the state.

@ Chapter 6 (Surface Water Resources) presents detailed information on the state’s surface water resources and includes estimates of available and existing surface water.

@ Chapter 7 (Groundwater Resources) presents detailed information on the state’s groundwater resources and includes estimates of available and existing groundwater.

@ Chapter 8 (Water Reuse) discusses water reuse in Texas, including projections of existing water supplies generated by this practice.

@ Chapter 9 (Water Supply Needs) summarizes water supply needs for different water users in the state during drought conditions and the potential socioeconomic impacts of not addressing water supply needs.

@ Chapter 10 (Water Management Strategies) discusses water management strategies recommended by planning groups and the volume and costs associated with these strategies.

@ Chapter 11 (Plan Implementation Funding) summarizes implementation costs of the 2007 State Water Plan, including statewide and regional cost estimates for water supply, water distribution and transmission infrastructure, wastewater treatment, and flood control.

@ Chapter 12 (Challenges and Uncertainties in Water Supply Planning) analyzes the challenges and uncertainties, such as changing conditions, natural or human disasters, and policy and legislative impacts, that affect regional and state water planning.

@ Chapter 13 (Planning Group Policy Recommendations) presents the range of policy issues and recommendations identified by planning groups.