Our group's recommendations for Floyds Fork listed below:

Our Recommendations for Floyds Fork

​Issue for Decision​

Our streams are a symbol of the health of our community.  What does it say about Louisville when we do not take action in the area of cleaning up our streams?  A city connected to her streams should take interest in the condition of her streams.  Not only do stream cleanups provide for better stream quality, a cleanup also allows members of our community to become connected to our local streams.  In an effort to become centered on the great waterways that helped build our city, we need to establish the connection between citizens and the stream.  Giving our community the opportunity to actively participate in helping our streams encourages our citizens to take pride in our waterways, which is one of our city’s current central goals.  Once our citizens are connected to the streams through a clean-up day, they can come back for other activities centered on the stream (e.g., “adventure trips”).

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Recommendation

Partner with Floyds Fork Creek Sweep and Operation Brightside, or create a 21^st Century Parks Floyds Fork cleanup and encourage college students in Louisville to participate.  Hold press conference in early spring announcing the cleanup and give students an incentive to attend (e.g., receive discount on canoe rentals).  Reach out to student led organizations on campus.  Start with UofL this year and spread to other campuses over the next 5 years.  After you start off the year with a cleanup, host “adventure trips” for college students to Floyds Fork every month or every other month, where students can canoe, hike, camp, etc.  Both the cleanups and adventure clips will bring more students to Floyds Fork and allow them to have an active participation in 21^st Century Parks and one of Louisville’s hidden gems: Floyds Fork.​

 

Background Information

21^st Century Parks is creating a park unlike any other in the United States.  Pairing college students with the Floyds Fork Creek Sweep and Operation Brightside, or even a 21^st Century Parks Floyds Fork cleanup and allowing them to participate in “adventure trips,” will raise awareness not only of the new park, but also of the environmental impacts affecting the creek.  This project will:

·      Bring students to an area of Jefferson County outside of UofL’s immediate surroundings and encourage students to become involved with a local stream.

·      Draw students’ attention to the pollution jeopardizing the health of Floyds Fork.

·      Create a connection between the students and Floyds Fork that will never be broken.

·      Allow the students to take an active role in bettering the city of Louisville.​

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Additional Considerations

·      Honors Volunteer Program at UofL is a branch of the Honors Student Council that participates in a wide variety of service activities each semester.

·      Welcome Week SOUL allows UofL students to connect to the Louisville community directly each year by participating in community service throughout Louisville.

·      Greek Organizations on UofL’s Campus do hundreds of hours of community service each year.

·      It would be in the parks’ best interest to reach out to these organizations on UofL’s campus to begin recruiting students to help in the cleanup and maintenance of Floyds Fork.

·      Cost: Trash/Recycling bags are $6 for a box of 25.  Food and drinks: Depends on the number of participants. Often water, donuts, coffee, and juice will be sufficient. Tools, gloves, and safety vests: You can ask participants to bring their own gloves/tools. Safety vests cost about $10 a piece.

·      Cost of “Adventure Trips”: Encourage students to bring their own tents and camping material.  21^st Century parks could furnish the canoes and paddles either for free or charge students $5-$10 per canoe rental.

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Closing Remarks

 

The Floyds Fork group hopes that 21^st Century Parks will not only participate, but also that they will help recruit college students for this great opportunity.​

 Issue for Decision

            As the Parklands are built around Floyds Fork, many more people will use Floyd’s Fork for recreation. 21^st Century Parks has a plan to build a recreational center that will rent canoes and kayaks. This will increase the usage of the Fork for canoeing and kayaking, and those people will need to be kept safe. Floyds Fork is one of the most undisturbed streams in the county, which means that there are some dangers that just naturally occur in the stream, such as fallen trees, or fast flowing water. ​

 

Recommendation

To protect those people using the stream, a canoe safety patrol should be implemented. The patrol would be comprised of trained volunteers, who go out onto the stream and monitor the stream for hazards, and to warn or prevent people from running into danger while enjoying the stream.​

 

Background Information

            A model of the safety patrol can be found in the north east. In the 1970s, the amount of people who canoed and kayaked on the Upper Delaware River increased. Therefore, a group of people decided that the safety of the people using the river needed to be ensured. Therefore, they created the National Canoe Safety Patrol. In 1980, the National Park Service assumed control of the upper Delaware River, and the National Canoe Safety Patrol was asked to continue their work alongside the National Park Service.

The safety patrol is a group of volunteers who are trained in recognition of river hazards, rescue, teaching and nature interpretation. The canoe safety patrol could train their members in the spring. Between May 1^st and Labor Day in September each member is required to patrol on weekends at least four times. They look for any river hazards and help people who are canoeing or kayaking on the stream.

                        

Additional Considerations

·      Scott Workman from the Kentuckiana Paddle Association has said that they wish to offer their help in creating this safety patrol.

·      Currently the Parklands directors are debating on how best to ensure the safety of people on the stream, and the volunteer patrol would be a great way to solve the problem and cost very little money. The main cost in this plan is training the volunteers.

·      This idea is not only just applicable to the waterway itself, but also can be applied to hiking and biking trails in the Parklands.  People who use those trails can be recruited to do patrols on those trails to ensure that they are safe for people to use during the peak season.

·      Those who do the patrols should wear some insignia while on patrol to identify them as a trained patrolman who can help any person in distress.

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Closing Remarks

            The model outlined from the Upper Delaware River can easily be adapted to Floyds Fork. There are many people around the county that enjoy using Floyds Fork for recreation. From them, volunteers could be found and trained to ensure the safety of everyone using the stream. As 21^st Century Parks opens different sections of their property, the volume of people visiting the stream will increase. After they open the recreational center, many more people will paddle down the stream. They need to be kept safe, so the patrol should be established by the time that the center opens in late 2013.

           

Issue for Decision

After researching about Floyds Fork for our Waterways of Jefferson County class at the University of Louisville, we visited the location. We noticed the surfaces being laid at the new Parklands were impervious surfaces such as concrete. When Scott Martin from 21^st Century Parks came to speak to our class we asked him questions about the amount of impervious surface in the area. We are glad to see certain measures in place to decrease the impact of imperious surface use on the watershed, but would like to recommend investigation into pervious surface use for large parking lots and picnic areas.

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Recommendation

To prevent harm to the watershed, pervious surfaces in the Parklands should be increased. Such an example will also provide an excellent opportunity to educate citizens about ways they can reduce their impact on the watershed. This can be done via educational materials and illustrations of the Parklands’ storm water neutral status at the newly built interpretative center.

 

Background Information

             Impervious surface Coverage:

The amount of impervious surface in urban areas tends to be very large. Currently, the coverage is low especially streamside because the majority of this area is farmland or golf courses. Though these have problems of their own, there is minimal impervious surface coverage (compared to Beargrass Creek in Jefferson County, KY) in the watershed due to the rural nature of the area. However, the current construction occurring in the Parklands from 21^st Century Parks would increase the impervious surface creek-side dramatically. The Louisville loop will have 18 miles within Floyds Fork and is composed of 12’ wide asphalt or crushed concrete. There will be 15 different parking lots within the Parklands just for the Louisville Loop.  

Alternatives to Impervious Surfaces:

There are alternatives to using impervious surface that will not increase flow rate and will replenish the aquifer. These include rain gardens and vegetation, but in general these are not used for parking lots and are not wheelchair accessible. 21^st Century Parks has gardens and swells in place for this purpose. An opposition for the use of pervious surface is often cost, maintenance, and wheelchair accessibility. The type and amount of material would vary, but in general pervious surfaces cost between $5 and $10 per square foot. And because maintenance costs increase the overall cost, it seems to be a poor choice. However, the cost can be competitive when it reduced the need for or size of curvbs and gutters (Please see http://www.lid-stormwater.net/permpaver_costs.htm for more information). Furthermore, there are pervious surfaces that are approved by the ADA (Please see http://www.invisiblestructures.com/white_papers/Gravelpave2ADAF1951-99.pdf for more information). So it would seem that pervious surfaces are beneficial especially when considering the cost savings related to erosion repair or water quality damage.  

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Closing Remarks

Our group at the University of Louisville hopes that Scott Martin and Dan Jones at the Parklands will work to maintain the water quality in Floyds Fork. 21^st Century Parks has mechanisms in place to monitor water quality, but with the spikes in the hydrograph for this area already showing damaging flow, increasing the impervious surface would only intensify this problem.  

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Thank you for your time.