Along the Delaware

Delaware River at Lambertville, NJ

My life's dream was to live beside a river. But a recent biking trip along the Delaware may have changed my mind.

Rivers have a powerful mystique - they are ever changing and yet eternal. When placid, their gentle ripples reflect the sun and sky. Within hours, they can become brown torrents, roiling and treacherous, that destroy everything in their path. What could be more fascinating than to witness such things first hand, day after day?

The Delaware doesn't seem to have any nicknames, unlike the Mississippi River, which has collected a number of handles like "Big Muddy" or "Ol' Man River" or "The Mighty Mississippi." No, this river is simply called "the Delaware."

The facts: 

The Delaware is the longest un-dammed river in the United States east of the Mississippi, extending 330 miles from the confluence of its East and West branches at Hancock, N.Y. to the mouth of the Delaware Bay where it meets the Atlantic Ocean. The river is fed by 216 tributaries, the largest being the Schuylkill and Lehigh Rivers in Pennsylvania. In all, the basin contains 13,539 square miles, draining parts of Pennsylvania (6,422 square miles or 50.3 percent of the basin's total land area); New Jersey (2,969 square miles, or 23.3%); New York (2,362 square miles, 18.5%); and Delaware (1,004 square miles, 7.9%). Included in the total area number is the 782 square-mile Delaware Bay, which lies roughly half in New Jersey and half in Delaware. 

-- The Delaware River Basin Commission

I often travel along the Delaware on my way to upstate New York. If the river is low, new islands stand exposed in the middle of the riverbed. If the river is high, muddy water washes through the trees and up into the back yards of the houses I can see across the way.

A subconscious conversation hums in the back of my mind as I drive my route. If I think about it, I realize I'm checking to see how well the houses nearest to the river have survived over the years. If they date from the Nineteenth Century, I figure they have seen a fair bit of high water in their lifetime and yet have survived. I notice what steps their owners have taken to keep them intact: evidence of flood damage repairs; newly elevated buildings; solid retaining walls. “That’s where I would live,” I murmur smugly to myself when I spot a place that appears unassailable, sure that property is the answer to a long and happy life on the river.

The small towns along the Delaware River are charming. Lambertville, one of the most intact, has filled many of its historic storefronts with antiques, home décor, restaurants, bed-and-breakfasts, and other upscale establishments. Every year, the annual “Shadfest” draws thousands of visitors, in addition to the usual crowds of summer day-trippers. Stockton and Frenchtown – albeit more modest in scale than Lambertville – also flourish mostly in the summer but are still real places to their year-round residents. Kayaking, biking, hiking, fishing, boating, shopping, eating – all great summer sports take place in these towns along the Delaware.

New Hope, PA, on the Delaware River.

Both sides of the river have historic canals and towpaths now maintained as state parks with bicycle/hiking trails. The feeder canal of the 70-mile Delaware & Raritan Canal system follows the river on the New Jersey side. In Pennsylvania, a 60-mile towpath follows the former Delaware Canal.  Each has its own distinct character.

Along the east bank of the Delaware, the tow path follows the state parklands through the communities of Lambertville, Stockton, and Frenchtown. It passes, for the most part, through heavily wooded areas somewhat elevated from the river. In the few areas where you pass near a settlement, a few of the newer houses are on pilings, elevated some 20 feet above grade. It seems impossible to think that the river would ever come up that high.

On the Pennsylvania side, much of the tow path passes through farmland and along the rear yard fences of some lovely vacation retreats on the canal. They are not elevated, to any great degree, and have beautiful, well-tended gardens. Many seem a fair distance from the river.

Although living by a river always has its share of dangers, recent years have brought more floods to the Delaware than anticipated. In 2004, 2005, and 2006, floods caused significant damage to a number of towns in the Delaware River Basin.

As recently as March 2011, flooding damaged significant sections of the towpath on the Pennsylvania side of the river, breaching the canal wall. Our recent bike tour followed the D&R towpath from Lambertville to Frenchtown, NJ, returning along the Delaware Canal on the Pennsylvania side of the river. Although the route on the New Jersey side was in excellent condition, the western bank showed dramatic evidence of the recent flooding, especially just north of the hamlet of Lumberville, PA, where the river jogs eastward - a point where the river had to clamber overland in its straight-line rush towards the Delaware Bay. Major repairs were clearly underway, but the towpath is still in rough shape, which prevented us from exploring this side of the river extensively. The canal is dry, logs and limbs brought down the river are lodged in trees, and houses we saw along the canal there have muddy feet – their canal-side gardens bore evidence of a recent high-water mark. Those with minimal damage have substantial stone or concrete retaining walls on the river side.

Lumberville-Raven Rock Pedestrian Bridge

We stopped for coffee in Lumberville, much of which is within a National Register-listed historic district along River Road. We asked the owner of the Lumberville General Store (1803) (great coffee and biscotti, by the way) how she had fared in the recent floods. She confidently said, “Oh, we’re up too high. We never get flooded.” The same providential siting has benefited the Black Bass Hotel across the street (shown in photo at right in background). This inn was built in the 1740s and still keeps an elegant watch over the Delaware River, just south of the pedestrian bridge over to Bull’s Island State Park. “However,” the store owner warned, “I think you might want to cross over to the Jersey side here – the tow path below Lumberville was washed out last month and is not ready for cycling yet.” Sure enough, when we looked over the railing on the way back to NJ, a large gouge taken out of the bike path had recently been stabilized by rough fill of orange clay and gravel. 

Although my romantic idea of living by a river still persists, the exigencies of preparing for these “significant flood events” – the number of which seems to have increased over the past few years – is enough to dissuade me from actually plunking down my money on a riverfront property. It's one of life’s turning points, I suppose, when practicalities outweigh romance.

Nothing, however, should dissuade anyone from visiting these delightful river towns and enjoying days on both sides of the Delaware. The area is one of New Jersey’s “10 Best.” And as for NJ's neighbor across the way, Pennsylvanians have chosen the Delaware as the 2011 River of the Year, according to a recent news release of the PA Department of Conservation and Natural Resources.

So, even if you don't live on the Delaware, you can still enjoy every minute of your stay. It's an amazing place.

The New Hope-Lambertville Bridge over the Delaware R.

Resources:

The Black Bass Hotel. Website. URL: http://www.blackbasshotel.com/ accessed May 18, 2011.

Borough of Frenchtown, NJ. http://frenchtown.com/

Borough of Stockton, NJ. URL: http://www.co.hunterdon.nj.us/mun/stockton.htm

City of Lambertville, NJ. Official website. http://www.lambertvillenj.org/

D&R Canal History, Delaware and Raritan Canal Commission, official website: URL http://www.dandrcanal.com/history.html, accessed May 18, 2011.

The Delaware River Basin Commission. "The Delaware River Basin." Official Website. URL: http://www.state.nj.us/drbc/thedrb.htm accessed May 22, 2011.

The Lumberville [PA] General Store. Website URL: http://www.thelumbervillegeneralstore.com/ accessed May 18, 2011.

“Lumberville-Raven Rock Pedestrian Bridge.” The Delaware River Joint Toll Bridge Commission. Website. URL: http://www.drjtbc.org/default.aspx?pageid=83 accessed May 18, 2011.

Pennsylvania, State of, Department of Conservation and Natural Resources. “Delaware Canal State Park - Park Field Guide.” Pennsylvania State Parks. Website. URL:

http://www.dcnr.state.pa.us/stateparks/parks/delawarecanal/delawarecanal_fieldguide.aspx accessed May 18, 2011.

--- "Pennsylvanians Choose Delaware as 2011 River of the Year." News Release. 13 January 2011. URL: http://www.prnewswire.com/news-releases/pennsylvanians-choose-delaware-as-2011-river-of-the-year-113453869.html

U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Philadelphia District. “Delaware River Basin Comprehensive Study - Interim Feasibility Study for New Jersey.” U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Website (Updated to 02-Feb-2011). URL: http://www.nap.usace.army.mil/Projects/delbasin/ accessed May 18, 2011.

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Hello, Sunbeam: Fleeting Light though Well-Loved Spaces

A splotch of rainbow appeared on the wall of the upstairs hall yesterday morning. A brilliant, prismatic, disembodied streak of light. How curious. For some 35 years I have lived in this house, but I'd never seen light falling on that wall before. I reached out my hand and caught the light in my palm. I leaned into it then looked backwards over my shoulder for the source. Ah, it was just a ray of sun glancing off the corner of the vanity mirror left standing open. Nothing mysterious. Just a happy surprise, after a long winter of cold grayness.

In these early days of "Just-spring," I am more aware of such luminous aberrations. I came downstairs one morning last week to see the folds of a sheer curtain on a north window lit by a rosy glow. It seemed far removed from any opening that might allow a ray of light to penetrate there. No, it wasn't Tinkerbell hiding there, as my young sons might have fantasized a million years ago. It was just the sunrise reflecting off my neighbor's window into my front hall, finally landing on the curtain two rooms away. Again, nothing mysterious. Just a wayward beam of light that had found its way into a dark corner of the front parlor.

My house was built around 1860. There have been a number of alterations to it over the years. A new porch in the early 1900s. An extension to the dining room in the 1940s. Several shutters have gone missing. But, for the most part, the house remains little changed from when it was originally built. For over 150 years, the light has entered this house through the very same window sashes. It follows the same path across my floors now as the one it traced in the 19^th Century.

Light was once considered the enemy of interiors. Indeed, sunlight is very destructive of just about everything domestic – textiles, paper, wood, works of art. The fight against its ravages was once waged not only by servants in grand houses, but also by housewives of more modest means. Fine things were expensive. Carpets, needlepoint, paintings, and furniture all reflected the family's position in society. They were part of the legacy to be passed down to future generations, and thus should be carefully conserved.

Exterior shutters were the first line of defense against sunlight in the 19th Century. Then came interior blinds and rolled shades; then curtains, first a sheer layer then finally heavy opaque fabric like brocade, lined with linen, which could be drawn against the harmful rays. Interiors were dim.

In the U.K., the epicenter of material culture during that period, curtains were covered with paper when the house was not occupied. Carpets were covered over with sheets of coursely woven fabric called “druggets” to prevent wear and fading. Upholstered furniture was covered not only with slip covers, but also top cloths to keep off the dust. It is interesting to note that the country houses north of London best known for their tapestries were often least used and, therefore, least subjected to light.

But farther north on that island, the attitude toward sunlight is much different. One September, I stayed in the hamlet of Sheildaig in the Scottish Highlands with a friend who was scouting a site for a cottage she hoped to build with her husband. This area of Scotland is at the same latitude as Labrador. Winters can be dreary affairs, often with somber skies and copious rainfall.  Even in fair weather, there might be less than an hour of daylight. The sun – or lack of it – plays a significant role in siting buildings.

Scottish Highlands near Sheildaig.

My friend and I explored a number of areas, ticking through a list of queries to find the ideal spot. Most of these related to the position of the sun. Where is south? Will the house be out of the shadow of that hill? If not, the building could spend five cold months during the winter without being touched by  a single ray of direct sunlight. What kinds of plants thrive here – do they reflect good conditions for a garden? Sunlight, in that place, is an important asset.

Conservators struggle to guard precious collections from the ill effects of light. Modern prescriptions for preventing deterioration of museum-quality interiors are based on a more scientific understanding of the properties of light than the slip-covers and druggets of the 19^th Century. They now well understand that incandescent bulbs emit little UV radiation, but generate a large amount of heat, which damages collections. Care is taken to keep the light at a low intensity and far enough away so that its effects on the items displayed are minimized. Under-shelf lighting, which tends to overheat an exhibit, is avoided. Florescent lights are cooler than incandescent ones, but emit UV; they should be fitted with a UV-absorbent jacket. In addition to shutters and sun-blinds of their predecessors, modern conservators use such things a UV-absorbent film installed on the window glass. (However, LED lights, the new darling of energy-efficiency moguls, have proved deficient as far as color discrimination and degradation of certain hues.)

My house, however, is a living-place, not a museum. My children have already put cartons of household treasures inherited from the dismantled homes of their grandparents in storage somewhere. I'm not sure how much more they want or need.

So, the rays of light that find their way into my house are welcome, if fleeting, visitors. Yes, I look at my rugs and my curtains and think, “These are getting a bit faded, aren’t they….” And yet I make no move to block the sunbeam that has traveled the same path across the floor of my dining room for going on two centuries. Far more important than protecting my aging furnishings is enjoying the perpetual - and sometimes whimsical - journey light takes through my well-loved spaces.

Resources:

Sandwith, Hermione and Sheila Stainton, Comp. The National Trust Manual of Housekeeping. New York: Penguin Books in Association with the National Trust [U.K.], 1985.

En-Joie Park, Endicott, NY: Vanquished by the Mighty Susquehanna

En-Joie (Ideal) Park Swimming Pool, Endicott, NY. Ca. 1910

When the waters of the Susquehanna River overtopped its banks and crept toward my grandmother’s house each spring, Dad would gather us in the car for a family field inspection. Grandmother's house was on Main Street just west of En-Joie Park, where Booth Avenue curved down into South Street by the tennis courts. Fortunately, the house was on a rise high enough to escape the flooding. But on the corner of South Street, just down the bank behind her house, were two houses that often fell victim to the river. They looked so forlorn -- surrounded by water, with no signs of life. It was the early 1950s. I was very young. 

My grandmother had four children by my Dad's father. Grandfather died in the 1920s, when my father was just 14 years old. In the 1930s, Grandmother remarried the widower of her sister - my Dad always called him "Uncle Rol" -- and moved herself and her family into his house on Main Street by the park. By the time I was born, Grandmother lived there with her stepson, my aunt, uncle, and my cousin, renting the place for around $25 per month. 

To us, one of greatest assets of my grandmother’s house was its proximity to En-Joie Park, which was just across the street. The park facilities -- except for the pool, which charged a small admission fee - were open and free to all. This was thanks to the generosity of Endicott-Johnson Shoe Co., which not only was benefactor of the park, but built the town of Endicott to house its workers. The park's name was pronounced "en-joy," building on the initials "E-J," the local nickname for the company.

The park played an important role in our family history. When my Dad was a teenager, he worked every summer at En-Joie. Sometimes he worked in the basket room at the bath house; sometimes at the clay tennis courts on South Street. It was through his work at the tennis courts that he fell in love with the game, becoming an avid player and later a local tennis champion.

Before the elder relatives from far-flung towns in upstate New York died off, we would all gather for family reunions in the wood picnic pavilions above the river. Since this was the Irish side of the family, no fewer than eight different family recipes for potato salad were laid out on the tables with the hot dogs and hamburgers. Children were allowed to roam freely in the park – we could swim,  ride on the carousel, swing on the swings, or torture our siblings with stomach-churning, bum-smashing drops when we jumped off the seesaw before they did. For hours, the men would sit at the tables and play cribbage, sticking their pins in the wood board all afternoon, oblivious to demands from spouses or children. Sometimes, there would be a concert in the bandstand.

En-Joie Pool, ca. 1910.

It was a rite of passage to be allowed to walk to the park alone on summer days. My brother and his friends, manly minimalists, rolled their bathing suits up in their towels. I always toted a girly beach bag containing my suit and towel, a peanut butter and jelly sandwich, with some change jingling around in the bottom. By the time we arrived, a line had already formed at the front entrance to the bath house. When the doors finally opened, we climbed the concrete stairs into the shadowy entryway, where we plunked our quarter on the worn counter.  In exchange we'd receive a wire basket with a brass tag on a stretchy band that we put on our ankle.

We would spend the whole afternoon at En-Joie, free of parents and responsibilities. The water in the huge, kidney-shaped pool was icy cold, even on the hottest days. It took forever from the moment I stuck my first toe into the freezing water until I dared a full-body plunge. But after a while, we didn't feel the cold. When our lips turned blue and our teeth chattered, we went over to the “baby pool” – a shallow, light-blue square adjacent to the big pool. The water was always warmer there.  We splashed though small ponds in the lawn at the perimeter of the pool that smelled of mud and cut grass and chlorine – smells that still today mix together in a pungent memory of my days at En-Joie.

Every summer I took swimming lessons at the pool. They started at 9:00 a.m. The water was even more frigid than it was at noon, but it didn't matter - we were eager to jump in and rack up as many little pins as possible. Tadpole. Dolphin. Swordfish. We pinned them proudly on our suits to let the world know how accomplished we were. Over the course of two or three summers, we'd finally be able to sew the exalted Jr. Lifesaving patch on our suits.

Winter comes to the Susquehanna River.

When winter came, we didn’t go to the park. It was empty, cold, and buried under a crusty layer of white. Anyway, we were too busy with winter things. In our absence, the frozen ground would press relentlessly against the empty concrete shell of the pool. Snow would weigh heavily on the  roofs of the old wood picnic pavilions. When the spring rains came, they would drench the hills and valleys around Endicott and fill the Susquehanna to the brim. Swift, muddy water would once again begin to climb over the banks towards my grandmother’s house. The river flooded the park, too, filling in the hollows near our favorite swings; inundating the little brook that flowed through the park with brown mucky water, leaving a skim of silt and sticks and debris; and covering the clay courts where I pictured Dad, forever young and tanned and smiling, playing tennis so long ago.

Flooding in En-Joie Park and Field, 1948. Vestal Bridge over the Susquehanna in background. Courtesy of Dryer Family photos: http://freepages.genealogy.rootsweb.ancestry.com/~dryer/page15.htm

Ultimately, flood control came to Endicott, authorized by the federal Flood Control Act of 1954. In 1957, construction began on a levee and a flood wall that would encircle En-Joie Park, dooming it thereafter to be a part of the sacrificial flood plain along the north bank of the Susquehanna. The project was completed in 1961.

The flood wall forever changed the way we thought of the park. The grassy slope we rolled down before we jumped over the brook into the park was replaced by a high earthen berm. We couldn't see over the top of it. When we were in the park, we couldn't see out. The brook was filled in. The berm was a steep climb, even for our strong young legs. And the grass - it wasn't soft and moist and fragrant like a lawn. It was bristly and dry, sown on hard clay compacted by steam rollers.  No longer a greensward, it was built to withstand the pressures of the river. The flood wall, although perhaps a godsend to many, was the beginning of the end of our happy childhood days in the park.

1957, the year the flood control project began, was also the year that the Endicott and Johnson families – families that had guided E-J Shoes since its beginnings in 1899 – brought in outside management. Thus began a long period of decline for a company that reportedly manufactured almost all of the footwear used by the US Army in both World Wars.

En-Joie Park faded with the fortunes of Endicott-Johnson. The pool's concrete shell developed severe cracks; it leaked; finally, whole sections of the wall collapsed inward and lay on the pool floor. The old wood pavilions were torn down. No tanned high school students worked the concession stand.  Or mowed the lawns. No one went there anymore.  Thoughts turned to the new park being built on high ground on the north side of Endicott, across town from where the Susquehanna flowed.

By 1965, George W. Johnson Park had opened on Oak Hill Avenue. It boasted a pristine Olympic-sized pool. Swing sets were salvaged from the old park and relocated to the top of the hill. The old carousel was removed from its decades-long home by the river and installed in a shelter in Highland Park, another new park north of town. A new generation of children -- at once joyous and fearful -- would hold tight to the reins of the brightly-colored horses and swans and pigs on the whirling merry-go-round, just as we used to do.

Once the new park opened, En-Joie was finally abandoned. The hole where the pool used to be was filled in. The towering old trees were cut down. The hills and dales of the park were leveled for new tennis courts and a baseball diamond. It became a non-place to our generation.

I was in one of the first crews of lifeguards hired for the new Northside pool, having earned the most coveted Red Cross patch - Water Safety Instructor - that year at college. Each weekday morning that summer I would teach the new crop of Tadpoles and Dophins and Swordfish how to swim. I put sticky white zinc oxide on my sunburned nose. As I made my rounds during free swim, I twirled my lifeguard’s whistle – the sign of ultimate authority to people under ten -- as had generations of lifeguards before me. I sat in the tall lifeguard chair and savored the fragrance of fresh-cut grass and chlorine and Coppertone. In the evenings, chilly in my wet bathing suit and wrapped in a towel tied at the waist, I would help close up the bathhouse for the night.

The pool was the place for giggling and splashing and sleeping on a towel in the sun, thinking of nothing in particular.  Freed from books and teachers and schedules, "horsing around" at the pool was a way that we tested our social skills. We carried the lessons learned at the pool into adulthood. There was a kind of cosmic resolution as I watched the new generation adjust to the idea that one could actually jump into freezing pool water at 9 a.m.  And not only did they live to tell about it, it became a point of pride. And, after checking off the list of skills mastered, they, too, could carry a  bright, new shiny swim pin on the strap of their little bathing suits that day.

I loved every minute of that job. Working summers in the town park felt like a family tradition, a legacy I inherited.  But living the legacy never held quite the same magic for me as did the old En-Joie of my childhood -- the now mythical place where I first learned to swim. It was all gone, conquered by the Mighty Susquehanna and the passing of time.

Former site of En-Joie Park in 2011

Resources:

New York State Department of Environmental Conservation,
www.dec.ny.gov/docs/water_pdf/fcpprjendcot.pdf

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Encounters with Big Muddy: My Introduction to the Lower Mississippi River

Grain silos on Mississippi River from Audubon Park, New Orleans, LA

“You’ll have to wait around for a week or so for your security clearance. But don’t be far away from your cell phone.” The 20-something who delivered this news looked tired. He had been processing the new wave of some 300 contractors who had been arriving steadily over the past 10 days. They had been recruited to work on FEMA’s Long Term Community Recovery program for Louisiana following Hurricanes Katrina and Rita -- the one-two punch delivered to Louisiana and Mississippi in August and September of 2005.

An hour earlier, I had landed at the Baton Rouge Airport along with a plane full of official-looking types. It was late January 2006, almost 6 months after “Rita-Katrina,” as we called it. I was about to begin work as a historic preservation specialist assisting in the next phase of the federal hurricane recovery efforts.

I’d never been to this part of the country before, so I decided to explore as much of the region as possible until the background check was completed. I fashioned a crash course for myself in the geography, climate, history, and architecture, embarking each morning on a different route out of Baton Rouge.

My first target was the architecture of the region and learning what had shaped it.  On the east bank of the Mississippi, I found LSU's Rural Life Museum, with wonderful examples of vernacular architecture, well-suited to the climate and culture of the back country.

Early shotgun house, Rural Life Museum, Baton Rouge, LA

Traveling along the west bank of the Mississippi, I found such treasures as Oak Alley, one of the early plantations and, many say, the "Grande Dame of the Great River Road," which was completed in 1841 and restored in 1925.

Oak Alley Plantation, Great River Road, Vacherie, Louisiana

Providing an underlying theme to my excursions was the iconic Mississippi River.  This was the languid, mythic river of Mark Twain. It is the river of commerce, central to our economy even today. It was also the rampaging river of 1927, which flooded thousands of miles of the heartland from Ohio to Louisiana and forever changed the ways in which the government tries to tame its waters -- attempts the river continues to defy.

So it was with great anticipation that I traced the Mississippi up one side and down the other in my travels.  And yes, I crossed over it a number of times. But it was impossible to get close to it. In spite of its dominant economic and cultural presence in the region, and its central role in our national history, I never felt as if I ever got a true sense of the river. I could not smell it, touch it, or watch its strong currents flowing by.

Tank farm and refining facilities on Mississippi River near Gramercy, LA

In the rural areas, protective levees had long ago been raised high above the river, blocking any views from the road. "No trespassing" signs cut off public access to the waterway. Near Baton Rouge, much of the Lower Mississippi is unrelentingly heavy-duty commercial. Here, public access to the waterfront is often blocked by industrial facilities such as warehouses, docks, tank farms, and refineries. Enormous barges ply the river or are parked along the docks. My views of the Mississippi were mostly quick left-right glances at 65 mph as I crossed over the bridges. From that perspective, the river looked torpid, thick - like gritty coffee with too much cream. But, of course, I saw it when it was quiet.

Veterans Memorial Bridge,LA-3213 over the Mississippi River, Gramercy, LA

The Mississippi is North America's longest and largest river in terms of the amount of water discharged. Each spring, engorged by melting snows and spring rains, the river wants to spread out across the great alluvial plain in the heartland as it did, unfettered, before the European settlers arrived. Since the mid-19^th Century, we have sought to discipline it, harness it, and protect ourselves from it.

The Mississippi River Commission, founded in 1879, was the first to undertake an effort to constrain the river exclusively by levees. The levees-only approach only exacerbated the problem by increasing pressure on the banks during high-flow events, resulting in their collapse. The approach was finally abandoned after the great flood of 1927, when the most of the levees in the Lower Mississippi failed, flooding some 26,000 square miles from Cairo, Illinois, to New Orleans. 

Horace Wilkinson Bridge, Interstate Route 10 at Baton Rouge, LA

The 1928 Flood Control Act gave the Corps of Engineers supervision of flood control in the region and launched what today is called the “Mississippi River and Tributaries Project.” This project introduced new ways to reduce flood damage: reservoirs, channel improvement and stabilization, and myriad other engineering solutions to control the unruly Mississippi. And yet, all those efforts seem doomed to failure. In 1983,  the Upper Mississippi saw the largest flood in the history of the United States to date. Already at this writing, towns in the Upper Mississippi River Valley are filling thousands of sandbags in preparation for the potentially massive floods along the river resulting from an unusually high snowfall over the past winter.

Each February, I think back to my first encounters with the Mississippi River in 2006. Although Baton Rouge proper is favorably positioned to ride out potential flooding along the Lower Mississippi unless it tops some 48-51 feet. elev., flooding on some of its tributaries have affected other areas of town. If all else fails, the Army Corps of Engineers can open the Morganza Spillway above Baton Rouge, which redirects the flow into the Achafalaya Basin where it can be absorbed by extensive wetlands. Nonetheless, everyone keeps one eye on the river when spring comes.

This treacherous and unpredictable river has created a distinct culture, built on commerce, wealth, and disaster. This river culture is what I hope to explore during the next phase of my learning about America. So the background readings have begun, the route is being plotted, research on the optimum season to begin the journey is underway. Perhaps I will see a few of you at some point along the Great River Road.

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Update (May 2011): The flooding along the Mississippi River anticipated some two months ago is now underway. The levees opposite Cairo, Illinois, have been dynamited, flooding hundreds of square miles of farmlands in neighboring Missouri. The Mississippi Delta, where the states of Arkansas, Louisiana and Mississippi come together, is preparing for historically high flood crests - higher even than the floods of 1927. Once again, all eyes are on the Mississippi.

See: Robertson, Campbell. "In Mississippi Delta, All Eyes on a Swelling River."New York Times (6 May 2011): A14. URL http://www.nytimes.com/2011/05/07/us/07flood.html?_r=1&scp=1&sq=mississippi%20delta&st=cse

Resources:

"Barry, John M. Rising Tide: The Great Mississippi Flood of 1927 and How it Changed America. New York: Touchstone, 1998.

Davis, Edwin Adams, Ed. The Rivers and Bayous of Louisiana1968. Gretna, LA: Pelican Publishing Company, Inc., 1998.

Crawford, Dr. G. “Controlling Floods along the Mississippi: Stainless steel wire embedded in concrete helps control erosion, improve navigation.” Nickel Magazine (March 2008). Online version: URL: http://www.nickelinstitute.org/index.cfm?ci_id=16769&la_id=1#  [The 2008 archives were recently deleted from the Institute's website. Dr. Gerald Crawford a Toronto-based consultant to the Nickel Development Institute.]

“Flood! Dealing with the Deluge.” Nova Online. Website: URL: http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/flood/deluge.html accessed February 28, 2011

Gazit, Chana and David Steward, Producers. “Fatal Flood.” Film aired on American Experience by Steward/Gazit Productions, Inc., WGBH Educational Foundation (2001). URL http://www.pbs.org/wgbh/amex/flood/maps/index.html accessed February 28, 2011. 

Geyer, Thomas. “Mississippi runs high risk of flooding this spring.” The Quad-City Times. Online version. January 28, 2011. URL: http://qctimes.com/news/local/article_280174dc-2aa1-11e0-9de5-001cc4c03286.html accessed February 28, 2011. 

The Mississippi River and Tributaries Project. New Orleans: U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District. Website. URL: (last updated May 19, 2004) http://www.mvn.usace.army.mil/pao/bro/misstrib.htm accessed 8 February 2011.

“Mississippi River Basin.” Water Encyclopedia: Science and Issues. Website. URL: http://www.waterencyclopedia.com/Mi-Oc/Mississippi-River-Basin.html accessed 8 February 2011. 

“The Mississippi River Flood Of 1993.”  The Weather Channel: Storm Encyclopedia

http://www.weather.com/encyclopedia/flood/miss93.html  accessed February 28, 2011.

National Aeronautic and Space Administration (NASA). “Flooding along the Mississippi (2002).” Visible Earth. Website. Visualization Date: 22 May 2002. URL http://visibleearth.nasa.gov/view_rec.php?id=2717 accessed February 28, 2011.

O’Connor, Anahad and Monica Davey. “Mississippi Surges over Nearly a Dozen Levees.” New York Times (20 June 2008). URL: http://www.nytimes.com/2008/06/20/us/20Floodcnd.html accessed February 28, 2011.
 

Scarpino, Philip V. Great River: An Environmental History of the Upper Mississippi 1890 – 1950. Columbia MO: University of Missouri Press, 1985.

Twain, Mark. Life on the Mississippi. 1883. Rpt. Signet Classics. New York: New American Library, a Division of Penguin Group, 2009. 

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A Lickety-Split Park Tour: What do you actually learn in 5 hours?

Sunset near King's Canyon National Park.

So you've just driven hundreds of miles to get to visit a national park. Maybe some of you have come all the way across country. Some of you have come from other countries. How long did you actually stay in the park once you got there? And .... the ultimate question.... was it worth it?

Last summer, I traveled around the western United States following the route of the 1920 National Park-to-Park Highway dedication tour. But many of you already knew that. But did I tell you how long they spent on the road to visit those 12 parks? How long they stayed in each one?

I was curious, because I have been dogged by the feeling that my compressed schedule - albeit unavoidable - gave these parks short shrift. Unworthy, somehow. And yet .... I felt exhilarated. Was I too easily satisfied? What was I looking for?

Thanks to the original itinerary, which was reproduced in The Playground Trail by Lee and Jane Whiteley, we can estimate how much time those 1920 travelers spent on the road vs. time spent they spent in the parks. We know, for instance, that the original route covered 6,350 miles. It took them 77 days -- about 82.5 miles per day. In most parks, they spent a just a half a day - probably around 5-6 hours. In rare cases they spent the night (although in vast Yellowstone they stayed on for several days and still felt that they hadn’t scratched the surface). In comparison, my trip around the loop took only 24 days (subtracting the days spent on diversions) -- an average of around 265 miles per day.

Service Station (1929), Longmire Historic District, Mount Rainier NP.

It’s not unexpected that the Park-to-Park tour took 3 times longer than it took me to drive about the same the distance, given the challenging road conditions in 1920. But I what I found most surprising: they spent about the same amount of time within each park as most visitors spend today.

Statistics about how long visitors stay per visit, what parts of the park they are most likely to see, the purpose of the visit (hiking, driving through, camping, hotel stay) – all these are useful tools for good park management. Without the numbers, it’s hard to prepare for possible adverse impacts to delicate ecosystems from foot traffic. How otherwise to anticipate vehicular impacts on roads and the level of regular and special maintenance that will be needed? What kind of merchandise should be stocked in the visitor centers? How many rolls of toilet paper should be ordered for the restroom facilities?

Visitor Center, Zion National Park, Utah

Putting aside the essential mission -- preservation of these unique environments for the benefit of humankind -- there are very practical needs that must be met for optimum accessibility and enjoyment by the public.  For the planners, each aspect of park use is studied and user needs anticipated to create a good visitor experience. For without a positive experience in the parks, no matter how extraordinary they may be in themselves, there is the deep-seated fear that we will become disenchanted with them. And if fewer people come, it may ultimately be felt in the budget allocations that allow us to protect the parks. The effects would be devastating, not only to the park system, but also to the many ancillary enterprises that depend on visitor traffic.

Needless to say, it's critical to make the parks work smoothly. The parks constantly work to accommodate a wide range of programs - recreational, educational, scientific, artistic - as well as handle the large crowds deftly, so that no one feels discomforted.  The optimum result is that each visitor senses that he or she has had a unique, personal encounter with nature at its most magnificent - a feeling perhaps shared by fellow travelers, but a private one nonetheless.

This summer's visitor count in our national parks reached historic highs during July and August. The overwhelming number of visitors made it something of a challenge to experience these breathtaking places on one's own terms. Unless you were camping in wilderness areas, moments of solitude were all but impossible. And, since I had no intention of giving some bear the opportunity of having me for an afternoon snack, camping for me was out of the question. Accommodations at the lodges and cabins had been fully booked for months. So I usually stayed in a hotel just outside the entrance gates.

Dawn at Twentynine Palms, CA, just outside Joshua Tree National Park.

Each morning began at dawn with a quick breakfast, then off to the entrance gate. I stayed, for the most part, on the major roads through the parks, stopping occasionally at a sampling of the more spectacular sites. Towards the end of the morning, a stop at the visitor center to look for books on the history and natural features of the park. Before noon, if I was lucky, my visit would happily conclude with lunch at one of the historic lodges where I could scan through the books I had just bought. Given a demanding schedule, I felt I didn’t have the time – at least on that trip – to take advantage of Ranger talks. And, although I am ashamed to admit it, I often gave the interpretive exhibits a only quick once-through. I was in and out of the park in less than 5 hours.

Dining Room, Glacier Park Lodge (1913), East Glacier, MT

Five hours doesn't sound like much. But according to the website National Parks Traveler, that's pretty typical. By its calculations, in 2008 the average visitor spent less than 5 hours per visit in almost 82% of America's national parks; in fewer than 5% of the parks did the average visit include an overnight stay. In spite of the great distances some travel to arrive at the entrance gates, the actual time spent in the parks seems minimal. And yet, many find the experience so valuable that they come away saying, “That was fantastic!”

I loved every second of my five hours. Seldom have I been more absorbed in my surroundings - looking, wondering, puzzling, trying to understand what I was seeing. And, of course, being on the alert for Wild Things. This urbanite had brought several multi-tasking amusements along just in case I got bored slowly crawling along the wilderness roads - satellite radio, audio books, etc. But I never once used them in the parks - they were an intrusion of the mundane into the sublime.

It is fascinating that, with so little time devoted to actually experiencing our national parks, we are so deeply entranced with them. Our love affair is certainly not founded in a John Muir-kind of sojourn: a contemplative meandering through the mountains and valleys of the American West.

Western Columbine, Mount Rainier NP

No, unlike Muir’s Nineteenth Century pace, our enjoyment of these Western wilderness areas is high-impact: immediate, sensual, experiential. Perhaps in another kind of park it would have been different, but I felt none the poorer for not having attended the Ranger talks or studied the interpretive exhibits with greater attention. All of that seemed an intellectual distraction from my more elemental experience.

Still-vivid memories of each park linger: the smell of crisp mountain air; the delicate drops of mist clinging to the wildflowers; the rays of light filtering through the giant Sequoia forests; the acrid sulfur smell that wafts through Yellowstone. These remembrances continue to inspire. No doubt, each traveler’s journey through our national parks is touched by similar moments that make the experience so pleasing to the senses, so uplifting for the spirit.

But, back to the practicalities of crowd management, toilet paper helps, too. And so to the engineers who fix the roads. And the Rangers who take care of us. And the naturalists who take care of the flora and fauna. And who could forget the visitor centers? And ….. well, lunch.

With all that to manage, I think the National Park Service has been doing a masterful job. Our national parks are as magical to us as they were to John Muir. Even though we can't stay very long.

Resources:

Bernstein, Danny. “The Numbers Behind National Park Visitation.” The National Park Traveler. (April 23, 2010). Website: URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/04/numbers-behind-national-park-visitation5723 accessed January 29, 2011.

Eagles, Paul F. J. and Stephen F. McCool. Tourism in National Parks and Protected Areas: Planning and Management. New York: CABI Publishing, a Division of CAB International, 2002.

Repanshek, Kurt. “Odds and Ends From Visitor Surveys at National Parks: You'd Be Surprised At Some of the Answers.” The National Parks Traveler (September 19, 2010). Website. URL:

http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/09/odds-and-ends-visitor-surveys-national-parks-youd-be-surprised-some-answers6861 accessed January 29, 2011.

Tilden, Freeman. Interpreting Our Heritage. 1957. 4th Ed. Chapel Hill NC: University of North Carolina Press, 2007.

Whiteley, Lee and Jane Whiteley. The Playground Trail - The National Park-to-Park Highway: To and Through the National Parks of the West in 1920. Boulder CO: Johnston Printing, 2003.

Roads through the Western National Parks: Struggling against Nature

 

“This Park was created, and is now administered for the benefit and enjoyment of the people. The government must continue to appropriate for it, especially in the direction of completing and perfecting an excellent system of driveways.”

--- President Theodore Roosevelt at the Dedication of the Roosevelt Arch
Yellowstone National Park, Wyoming
April 24, 1903

 
 As I write this, it’s around 40° in New Jersey and the roads are crowded with cars, people are shopping, returning unwanted gifts, or getting ready for their New Year's Eve celebrations. My thoughts, however, are in Yellowstone National Park, where it's -13° F. All is quiet under the snow except for the hissing of steam and bubbling mudpots. The loop roads through Yellowstone have been closed to vehicles for months, except for one. The road across the northern part of the park, from the North Entrance to Cooke City, Montana, is the only one that the park service will continue plow over the winter months.

The story is similar to that of many western mountain parks. Glacier, Mount Rainier, Crater Lake, Lassen Volcanic, King’s Canyon and Sequoia, and Rocky Mountain National Parks -- all either allow only limited access or close roads to vehicular traffic entirely until late spring, when the snows finally retreat.

My musings on winter road conditions in the western national parks may seem a bit misplaced for this New Jerseyan, especially since we so recently endured a traffic nightmare from our own record-setting “Christmas Weekend Blizzard.” However, the study of roads through the parks was a major focus of my trip there last summer. My work as a historic preservation consultant often requires me to study the history and design of what we call “engineering resources” - bridges, roads, dams, and other elements of infrastructure. The roads in particular have always intrigued me: How have we learned over time to transport people and goods expeditiously over long distances and difficult terrain?

To prepare for the trip, I had dutifully studied the history of the parks movement and a little about the state of the roads in 1920, the year of the National Park-to-Park Highway Dedication Tour, the route I would follow. Nothing I had read, however, had totally prepared me for the challenges that faced roadbuilding and maintenance efforts in the western region. These become clear only when you actually see them for yourself.

Road tunnel through rock outcrop near Box Canyon, Mount Rainier National Park

Most of the national parks I visited are part of the mountainous spine of the North American Continent known as the Western Cordillera. It is composed of numerous mountain ranges; the Cascades, the Rockies, the Sierra Nevadas are among the well-recognized names. They are largely composed of rock – all kinds: sedimentary, metamorphic and igneous. The roads often cling to rock faces of these mountains, which rise straight up from the edge of the road until they disappear from sight hundreds of feet above you. On the other side of the road is often a precipitous slope to a valley hundreds of feet below you. The roads traverse glacial moraines, canyons, and areas punctuated by potentially lethal thermal features such as colored hot springs, bubbling mudpots, and steaming fumaroles.
 

Road along Yellowstone River, Yellowstone National Park

As a result of these harsh conditions, the roads through America's western national parks demand careful thought and engineering. Not only must the roads negotiate extremely rugged terrain, they must stand up to the rigorous demands of climate, weather, and geology. Events such as landslides, torrential rains and floods, fires, and even seismic or volcanic activities continue to cause major damage to roads throughout the park system over time, damage that must be repaired to keep the parks open to visitors. And then there are the visual characteristics of the road system: the National Park Service guidelines require that roads through the parks be unobtrusive, never detracting from the scenic wonders that they serve and otherwise being visually compatible with the natural environment.

Last but not least, the roads must also withstand the impact of the vehicles used by millions of visitors every year. Cars, motorcycles, RVs, trucks, and bicycles – a very diverse collection of vehicle sizes, weights, speeds and vulnerability seeks safe passage through the parks via the roads. As the early founders of the parks learned, good roads to and through the parks are critical to the public's appreciation of these unique areas.

Traffic on Going-to-the-Sun Road, Glacier National Park

Because these parks are located in the mountains, the summer offers only a very short period during which road construction activities can be carried out. Many of the roads in the mountainous parks are closed by September or October due to heavy snow, and may not open again until late May or even early July. Even in mid-July 2010, fully one quarter of the Crater Lake National Park Rim Road was still closed due to snow. That same month, I saw a 6 – 10 feet snow pack along the sides of the road in areas of Mount Rainier, Glacier, and Lassen Volcanic National Parks.

Snow along road in July 2010. Lassen Volcanic National Park

However, the period from mid-June to mid-September also is when most visitors come to the parks. Road congestion is inevitable and, in recent years, expected. From the National Park Traveler’s website: 

“[In 2010] Yellowstone set a record with more than 3.6 million visitors, Glacier set a record with more than 2.2 million, Yosemite closed in on 4 million visitors, as did Grand Canyon. And Great Smoky Mountains National Park had a strong year with some 9.5 million visitors despite a year often  marked by road construction and detours. And those were just the name-brand parks." [“Looking Back on 2010 Across the National Park System: National Parks were Popular.” National Park Traveler (December 31, 2010)].

Among the original 12 parks I toured this summer, all had ongoing major road repair projects. Only two newer parks in California - Joshua Tree NP (created 1994) and Redwoods State and National Parks (created 1968; expanded 1978) – were free of construction when I passed through.

In Yellowstone, the change in road alignment and new bridge over the Gibbon River was completed in late October 2010, after tying up traffic between Norris and Madison for more than a year. The improvement is more than just a new bridge, however.

Road realignment and construction of new bridge over Gibbon River, Yellowstone National Park

According to the National Park Service:

"Wetlands, rare plants, thermal areas, and even the path of the Gibbon River itself were disturbed when the old road was built in the 1930s. Work is now underway to remove the old road and bridge and restore the 2-mile section of river corridor.

The land along the river is being reshaped back to the way it was before the old road was built, and thousands of native plants grown from seed are being planted in the area. When completed, about  three acres of wetland habitat will have been restored. [News Release, Yellowstone National Park,  WY, National Park Service, September 1, 2010]."

In Glacier National Park, the remarkable Going-to-the-Sun Road is undergoing an extensive rehabilitation, which is occurring over several years. During the planning and environmental impact assessment stages in the early 2000s, extensive public opinion guided the Park service to the preferred alternative of “Shared Use” during the height of the visitor season, mid-June to mid-September. This means that the formidable numbers of vehicles passing through the park, like many other national parks, are subjected to alternating one-way traffic in construction zones and sometimes  considerable waits. In the months immediately before and after the peak visitor period, the road is closed to permit accelerated construction activity.

In December 2010, the Zion-Mt. Carmel Highway from Canyon Junction to the east entrance of Zion National Park was closed due to flooding that undermined a section of the roadway. That highway is also undergoing its first extensive rehabilitation in 8 decades, which will take place over several years. 

Along the Zion-Mt. Carmel Road, Zion National Park

At Mount Rainier, work is still being done on the Nisqually Road, much of which was washed out in 2006. The current work is needed after another flood in 2009 undermined and collapsed a section of the road near the National Historic Landmark District of Longmire. In fact, according to Jeffrey P. Mayor in his excellent article in the Bellingham Herald (December 6, 2010), the 18-mile road between Nisqually and the visitor center at Paradise has been often threatened in recent years by debris flows, glacial outbursts, and flooding, much of which can be attributed to climate change and the retreat of the glaciers on the mountain. The substantial economic impacts of lost revenue from the closure of this road are felt not only by the NPS, but also the local businesses that depend on visitors to the park, so it is critical to keep the park roads open. This can be expensive.

Recent repairs at Mount Rainier and other parks have been aided by partial funding of the American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009. According to a staff member at Mesa Verde visitor center when asked about all the road projects in the parks, he replied that the National Park Service has a very vigorous planning department, which had a number of projects that were "shovel ready" and thus eligible for funding under the economic stimulus legislation. Planning efforts are ongoing, however, as is the need for funding. At Mount Rainier, a $30 Million, 3-phase plan is in the works to repave the Nisqually-Paradise road, which will need future allocations.

Glacial moraine from bridge over Nisqually River, Mount Rainier National Park

And so the story goes. Park after park; project after project - lines of traffic delays can be found in just about every park in the park system. And yet, for all the down-time waiting for your lane to get the go-ahead, for every slow ride through construction areas, for all the bumper-to-bumper traffic we endured, I never heard one word of complaint from a member of the public.

Waiting for our turn to descend the Generals Highway, Sequoia National Park

We shrugged our shoulders and bore it all rather complacently. It seems a small price to pay for the opportunity to see such wonders. We owe a lot to the hearty masons, heavy equipment operators, the flagmen and women, and the engineers who work under the doubly difficult mandate: not only to accomplish the work itself, but also to safely shepherd the public around the danger zones.

The public, from what I could see, seemed proud to have evidence that the nation is taking care of its natural heritage. And, although the amount of visitor traffic generally in the parks was somewhat daunting - I did everything possible to avoid it - the ongoing construction work was, for this road maven at least, an interesting attraction of its own.

Resources:

Culpin, Mary Shivers. The History of the Construction of the Road System in Yellowstone National  Park, 1872-1966: Historic Resource Study. Vol. 1. Selections from the Division of Cultural Resources, No. 5, Rocky Mountain Region, National Park Service, 1994. National Park Service Online Books. URL http://www.nps.gov/history/history/online_books/yell_roads/index.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Glacier National Park: Going-to-the-Sun Road Rehabilitation Photo Gallery.” Western Federal Lands Highway Division. Federal Highway Administration, U.S. Department of Transportation Website. URL: http://www.wfl.fhwa.dot.gov/projects/gtsr/gallery.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Images of the Flood of 2006.” Mount Rainier National Park. PDF booklet. Washington DC: National Park Service website. URL http://www.nps.gov/mora/parknews/images-of-the-flood-of-2006.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

Mayor, Jeffrey P. “Drivers may face delays on Nisqually Road.” The Olympian (August 29, 2010). URL: http://www.theolympian.com/2010/08/29/1350882/drivers-may-face-delays-on-nisqually.html accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Receding glaciers on Mount Rainier threaten park's major roadways.” The News Tribune (Tacoma) (Dec. 06, 2010). Online edition. URL: http://www.bellinghamherald.com/2010/12/06/1757401/receding-glaciers-on-mount-rainier.html accessed December 31, 2010.

“Mount Rainier Receives $3.3 Million for American Recovery and Reinvestment Act of 2009 Projects.” News Release. Mount Rainier National Park, National Park Service (April 24, 2009). URL: http://www.nps.gov/mora/parknews/upload/MORA%20Gets%20$3.3%20mill.pdf accessed December 31, 2010.

Reichard, Sean. “New Bridge Opens Over Yellowstone's Gibbon River.” Yellowstone Insider. Minneapolis MN:August Publications, 2010. Online edition. URL http://www.yellowstoneinsider.com/20100712606/news/articles/new-bridge-opens-over-yellowstones-gibbon-river.php accessed December 31, 2010.

Repanshek, Kurt. “Big, Bold and Beautiful, New Road and Bridge Over Gibbon River in Yellowstone National Park is Completed.” National Parks Traveler. Website (October 25, 2010). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/10/big-bold-and-beautiful-new-road-and-bridge-over-gibbon-river-yellowstone-national-park-completed7122 accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Looking Back on 2010 Across the National Park System: National Parks were Popular.” National Park Traveler (December 31, 2010). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2010/12/looking-back-2010-across-national-park-system7320 accessed December 31, 2010.

----- “Zion National Park Planning To "Rehabilitate" Mount Carmel Highway.” National Park Traveler (November 11, 2008). URL: http://www.nationalparkstraveler.com/2008/11/zion-national-park-planning-rehabilitate-mount-carmel-highway accessed December 31, 2010.

“Yellowstone National Park: Gibbon Canyon Night Closures End.” News Release. Yellowstone National Park, WY: National Park Service, U.S. Department of the Interior, September 1, 2010. Online version. URL: http://www.nps.gov/yell/10097a.htm accessed December 31, 2010.

“Zion-Mount Carmel Highway in Zion National Park Reopens.” News release. Zion National Park, UT, National Park Service (December 24, 2010). URL: http://www.nps.gov/zion/parknews/zion-mount-carmel-highway-in-zion-national-park-reopens.htm accessed December 31, 2010.