Daylighting (streams)

[1][2] Typically, the rationale behind returning the riparian environment of a stream, wash, or river to a more natural above-ground state is to reduce runoff, create habitat for species in need of it, or improve an area's aesthetics.

Some efforts to blend urban development with natural systems use innovative drainage design and landscaping instead of traditional curbs and gutters, pipes and vaults.

The project built bioswales, landscape elements intended to remove silt and pollution from surface runoff water and planted 100 evergreen trees and 1,100 shrubs.

[8][9] With impervious surfaces having replaced most of the natural ground cover in urban environments, habitat for wildlife is dramatically reduced compared to historic baselines.

The idea was to bring the stream back to its once natural formation which would improve the surrounding habitat for wildlife as well as the originally proposed purposes.

In a collaborative project between Spanish Banks Streamkeepers Association and the Department of Fisheries and Oceans Canada, barriers to fish passage were removed and habitat structure was added.

The restoration of this habitat using the rainway proposal would allow for salmon spawning, recreational and educational opportunities, and improve the community's access to nature and transportation alternatives.

The project was deemed feasible and the storm water was to be diverted back into the natural creek bed and tunneled under Point Grey Road.

[30] Credit Valley Conservation (CVC) worked with a private landowner to daylight 500 m of coldwater stream on their Caledon family farm.

[38] Yonkers, New York, the third largest city in the state, broke ground on December 15, 2010, on a project to daylight of the Saw Mill River as it runs through its downtown, called Getty Square.

[40] Red Butte, Emigration, and Parleys Creeks flow into the Jordan River at 1300 South and 900 West in Salt Lake City, UT.

In 2017, an Achievement Award from the Utah Chapter of the American Planning Association was received for the innovative project design and creative community engagement process.

Inspirationally, several hundred small resident coastal cutthroat trout live in the watershed, believed to be native fish that survived decades of urban assault.

The creek waters are pretty in their impressively restored settings, but the watershed is the surrounding neighborhoods and streets, laced with petrochemicals, pesticides, fertilizers, wandering pets, and such.

Along with steeply high volume during storm runoff and resulting turbidity, water quality is the remaining big issue in restoring salmon.

Coho salmon and cutthroat trout returned as soon as barriers were removed, after concerted effort and pressure by citizen groups of activist neighbors (1989–1998).

[46] The 98 acre (400,000 m2) watershed is about two-thirds residential development, from 1900s summer colony to post-World War II urban, with the rest natural space, primarily Fauntleroy Park.

It flows north from Roxhill Park for several miles along the valley of the Delridge neighborhood of West Seattle, turning east to reach the Duwamish Waterway via a 3,300 ft (1000 m) pipe beneath the Bethlehem Steel plant (now Nucor).

Farther upstream the city has been enlarging and building more storm-detention ponds, recreation areas, and an outdoor-education center at Camp Long.

[9] An area of 3 acres (12,000 m2) of open upland, wetland and wooded space just east of Chief Sealth High School in Westwood is the first daylight of Longfellow Creek.

[51] Persistent efforts began (1995) with informal removal of ivy smothering trees, then invasive species like holly, laurel and blackberries, and realization that effective restoration would require comprehensive stewardship.

Neighborhood groups, planning with naturalists and landscape architects, brought an effective early step rebuilding trails, promoting access and building constituency.

Further priorities were protection for habitat, restoration of stream beds, rehabilitation as a natural area using native plants, and using the Madrona Woods as a setting for environmental education programs at local schools.

A hired landscape architect became a team member, experimental plots were set up to test different methods for revegetating with native plants.

Friends of Madrona Woods earned a much larger Department of Neighborhoods matching grant in 2000, funding the creation of a master action plan, and major trail restoration work.

In the process of clearing, volunteers found substantial erosion in the wetland hillside, leading to a grant from a Parks Department fund to stabilize it with a water cascade of natural materials.

A feasibility study for the scheme was undertaken for South Yorkshire Forest Partnership by Sheffield City Council in 2013 [54] with funding from the Environment Agency and the EU via the Interreg North Sea Region Programme.

The Porter Brook daylighting scheme featured in a 2016 BBC Radio 4 documentary entitled A River of Steel, produced by sound recordist Chris Watson, ex-member of Caberet Voltaire.

Mayor Lee Myung Bak, formerly a construction magnate with the Hyundai chaebol that helped bury the river, ran for office promising to daylight it, and achieved in 2005 a 5.8 kilometres (3.6 mi) greenspace in a city without very many parks or playgrounds.

[citation needed] The new park is hugely popular, alleviating fears that opening the river would cause nearby businesses to lose customers.