Prospective Research Teams
1. Chollas Creek Watershed Pollution Atlas. What are the known pollutant sources and polluted sites in the within the Chollas Creek watershed? This information may be used to produce a map or other education materials to inform the community.
2. Report Card (Sustainability indices) for the Chollas Creek. What is the current state of natural resources in the Chollas Creek watershed? Modeled after reports for other urban watersheds. This project may include the development of a report that helps community members understand the state of their natural resources.
3. The Chollas Creek watershed in the context of regional planning. What are the current development plans, conservation plans and visions for the Chollas Creek. What role does the new regionalism play, if any, in the approach to watershed management.
4. Evaluation of the decision making process for the Chollas Creek watershed. What questions are decision makers asking and what factors influence decisions? What information is missing? How are decisions being made in the absence of information and data? How is the community involved in this process?
The Chollas Creek Watershed is a sub-unit of the Pueblo Watershed. See map of the Pueblo Watershed : http://www.sdwatersheds.org/wiki/images/0/01/Pueblo0309.jpg
Context
In the larger Tijuana-San Diego region, the Pueblo watershed is of particular interest because of its location and the many efforts that are underway there to resolve critical environmental issues.The Pueblo watershed is the most developed of three major watersheds that drain directly into San Diego Bay. Notwithstanding its beauty, San Diego Bay is the second most polluted bay in the country next to Newark, New Jersey (1,2). The Pueblo watershed covers some 50 square miles of the most urbanized and densely populated areas of the City of San Diego, La Mesa, Lemon Grove, National City and the County San Diego. This watershed also includes many waterbody segments (e.g., estuaries, creeks) that are listed as impaired under the Clean Water Act § 303d for exceeding water quality contamination standards (2).
The Pueblo watershed drainage consists of a group of relatively small local creeks and pipe conveyances, many of which are concrete-lined and drain directly into San Diego Bay. The creeks in the watershed are highly impacted by urban runoff, and Chollas Creek and the mouth of the creek in San Diego Bay are listed as 303(d)-impaired water bodies for various trace metals parameters and aquatic toxicity.Source: http://www.projectcleanwater.org/html/ws_pueblo.html
Over many years, combined point and non-point source pollution discharges from the Pueblo Watershed have created five known toxic hot spots in San Diego Bay (3). Currently, many federal, state, regional and local government agencies, along with academic and community stakeholders, are focused on trying to understand and resolve pollution problems in the Pueblo watershed. The regulatory effort underway in the Pueblo watershed is the first comprehensive attempt in our region to address impaired waterbodies as required by the federal Clean Water Act, a process that includes establishing Total Maximum Daily Loads or TMDLs (4). TMDLs set limits for how much of a given contaminant can enter a waterbody on a daily basis without exceeding contamination standards or impairing beneficial uses (e.g., drinking, swimming, fishing). The outcome of current efforts in the Pueblo Watershed will likely set an important precedent for how other pollution issues in the region are managed, including pending issues related to 303(d) impairments in the Tijuana River watershed, among others. Students have the opportunity to address research questions dealing with the decision making processes, community education, public participation and access to information, regulation, use of new knowledge and technologies (e.g., “Green” Urban and Architectural Design, Construction and Industrial Processes) to reduce or eliminate pollution, among many others.
Sources:
(1) County of San Diego. Project Clean Water. Pueblo Watershed. 2001. Available:
http://www.projectcleanwater.org/html/ws_pueblo.html [Accessed 12 January 2007]
(2). SD Earth Times. Pollution Politics Persists. What do you do when the regulators refuse to regulate? 1999. Available: http://www.sdearthtimes.com/et0499/et0499s5.html
[Accessed 12 January 2007]
(3) California Environmental Protection Agency. State Water Resources Control Board. Bay Protection and Toxic Cleanup Program. (BPTCP). 2004. Available: http://www.waterboards.ca.gov/bptcp/ [Accessed 12 January 2007]
(4) U.S. EPA (United States Environmental Protection Agency). Introduction to the Clean Water Act. http://www.epa.gov/watertrain/cwa/
For an excellent study about Chollas Creek (which won an ANALYSIS AND PLANNING HONOR AWARD from the American Society of Landscape Architects), see:
Kids at the Creek: Planting the Seeds of Stewardship in Chollas Creek
Jacey Garrison, Student ASLA, Emily Kiefer, Student ASLA, Ceanatha La Grange, Student ASLA and Mario Benito, Student ASLA
California State Polytechnic University Pomona, Pomona, California
Faculty Advisors: Ken McCown, ASLA; Joan H. Woodward, FASLA; Phil Pregill, ASLA; Doug Delgado
Project Statement: Kids at the Creek focuses on the creation of a new generation of environmental stewards to address the challenges facing urbanized watersheds. By creating stewards through education, community participation and design, this unique two-pronged action and awareness plan goes beyond scientific studies and regulatory policies. Changing the mindset of people and how they approach wildlife, in combination with ecological planning, is the only way to achieve a symbiotic relationship between people and nature. Kids at the Creek Award Website
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