Excerpt
IN the early 1980s, watershed projects with flood control as a primary purpose became increasingly difficult to develop in Missouri. Even though agricultural flood damages on northern Missouri streams continued to be a major problem, the traditional projects consisting of a few floodwater-retarding dams controlling up to 10 square miles of drainage area were becoming economically marginal. During the 1970s, the cost of construction had increased significantly, while the price of agricultural commodities remained constant or in some cases even decreased.
To develop economically defensible projects, dams were required to control more and more drainage area (10 square miles or more). Many plans lacked acceptability, both from an environmental standpoint and landowner acceptance. The sediment and flood storage pools of these larger dams would inundate 125 to 500 acres of the landowner's most productive cropland or, in some cases, destroy large tracts of bottomland hardwoods (which today in many cases would be classified as wetlands). The pools associated with these structures were inundating some of the very land the watershed program was designed to protect. Construction costs of the traditional Public Law 566 dm also …
Footnotes
Michael D. Wells is assistant state conservationist for water resources with the Soil Conservation Service, U.S. Department of Agriculture, Parkade Center, Suite 250, 601 Business Loop 70 West, Columbia, Missouri 65203.
- Copyright 1991 by the Soil and Water Conservation Society
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