PARENT SESSION
Poster Session #10: Restoration Education.
Monday, August 5. Presentation from 5:00 PM to 6:30 PM. Exhibit Hall B & C, TCC

Bugs, slugs, and other icky stuff: Restoring nature back into urban streams.

Link, Mark^*,1, ¹ Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District, Cleveland, Ohio

ABSTRACT- Stream restoration philosophies are most often focused on restoring natural stream functions and restabilizing eroding banks. While these elements are critical to a successful restoration project and should be the primary focus, projects often fall short of educating the people that are most impacted by a restoration effort. Urban streams in particular are often viewed as a community liability rather that an asset to the neighborhood, and are thereby treated with very little care and often with a great deal of disrespect. Even after a successful restoration project, the community doesn't see the stream as a natural environment. When designing urban stream restoration projects in the Cleveland, Ohio area, the Northeast Ohio Regional Sewer District (District) uses a community education approach in all of its restoration efforts. Restoring the streams natural functions and processes continues to be the key focus of our restoration designs, but we also rely on a neighborhood design charrette format to incorporate resident's ideas and concerns into the project design. The charrette also serves as the venue for restoring the community's view of the stream. We view a successful restoration project as one that restores the natural functions of the stream, has improved the in-stream habitat, and can serve as an educational arena for urban students. The basis of this poster is to outline the District's approach in designing successful urban stream restoration projects with a focus on creating learning centers for urban education.

KEY WORDS: stream restoration, urban, urban education, natural channel design