Native plants return to Mill River If a river herring had tried to swim up Mill River to spawn last spring, it likely would have been thwarted by a hulking concrete block beneath the Pulaski Street bridge -- a remnant of a dam dating to the 1800s. Today, the herring instead would encounter a riverbed engineered to encourage its life cycle. After demolishing and removing the dam in April, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers installed several thousand cubic yards of river stone to recreate the water bed, according to Adam Burnett, manager of the project for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. The work is part of the ongoing $7.9 million Mill River restoration project. "We wanted it to provide during low tide a gentle slope so the fish can swim up the river," Burnett said. "We're expecting the river herring to migrate once they rediscover the river." River herring, also known as shad, are listed as a "species of concern" by the National Oceanic and Atmospheric Administration's National Marine Fisheries Service because of declining numbers in Connecticut and across the Eastern seaboard. Many other native species, including predators such as ospreys, bald eagles, harbor seals, sea otters and striped bass depend upon the fish for their survival. The fish must spawn in fresh water, and dams and other impediments are one of the factors in their decline, the NOAA report said. Welcoming fish back to the river is only one element of the Mill River restoration. The Army Corps started in March, clearing the historic cherry trees in Mill River park to make way for later work. For the past two weeks, workers have been planting native flora along the riverbanks between Pulaski Street and Richmond Hill Avenue. Before completing the project next year, the Army Corps plans to remove the concrete walls and Main Street dam that pen in the river, craft a natural flood plain aimed to reduce flooding, and plant hundreds of native trees in Mill River park. The Army Corps funded $5 million of the project; the city provided the remaining $2.9 million. Ultimately, Mayor Dannel Malloy and city planners hope to create -- through $20 million in private funding that the Mill River Collaborative hopes to raise -- a 26-acre park and 3-mile greenway stretching from Scalzi Park to Long Island Sound. The collaborative, a nonprofit agency partnered with the city, has met $1.8 million of that goal. Standing in front of the water-stained, partly crumbling concrete walls and surrounded by construction equipment and mountains of dirt in Mill River park Monday, Mill River Collaborative Chairman Arthur Selkowitz hailed the work as signs of a "dream taking root." The river will flow freely for the first time in 350 years after the Army Corps removes the Main Street dam in August, Selkowitz said. Malloy said the Mill River project had been a dream of city leaders since 1891, when the head of Yale and Towne's bolt and lock division suggested connecting the race course in Scalzi Park to an island in the harbor (now Kosciuszko Park) via a park that would run through the heart of downtown. The idea was controversial at the time, because people feared the park would be used by an incoming wave of Irish immigrants, Malloy said. It also was labeled a potential "million-dollar boondoggle." "We will look back at this day in the same way people look back at the founding of Central Park in New York," Malloy said. Up the river, near Pulaski Bridge, workers were busy planting black chokeberry bushes. In the past two weeks, they had pulled out invasive plants -- bittersweet vine, Japanese honeysuckle and multiflora rose -- and replaced them with native marshland plants, salt tolerant grasses that will encourage the habitation of fiddler crabs, turtles and eels. Blueberry bushes, speckled alder and winterberry holly, in planters, also were being prepared. To the south, where the Pulaski dam once blocked silt and debris, the water flowed freely, bringing salt water once again to the channel. The dam was detrimental to natural wildlife not only because it blocked fish -- striped bass, snapper and bluefish among them -- said Vincent Piselli, land manager of Mill River Park. By blocking debris that would periodically flood over the dam, it encouraged the growth of oxygen-robbing algae that contributes to the death of wildlife in the Sound. With the dam removed, the river naturally will flush itself, creating a sandy bed for oysters and other shellfish to live on, he said. "It's not just that it's a wall that stops fish," Piselli said. "It's a wall that plugs trash, ecological garbage that explodes down the river." For now, the planting work spans from Pulaski to Richmond Hill, but the Army Corps hopes to plant more shrubs and trees by Scalzi Park by the end of next month, said Vanessa Valadares of the city engineering department. If the Army Corps is not able to squeeze the work at Scalzi into the planting season this year, it will tackle that project next spring, along with planting hundreds of native trees and re-landscaping Mill River Park. The city plans to plant saplings cultivated from the original Mill River cherry trees after the Army Corps work is done, likely in fall 2010, Land Use Chief Robin Stein said. Ceneida Diaz, who lives in Edward Czescik Homes, a one-story public housing apartment complex for senior citizens that faces the river on Greenwich Avenue, said she was happy to see the work in her backyard. The area was ugly and filled with brush when she moved in five months ago, she said. Now "it's pretty," said Diaz, 75. "I like it. It's very cool." |
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