This story first appeared in The Outsider, the premium outdoor newsletter by Jason Blevins.In it, he covers the industry from the inside out, plus the fun side of being outdoors in our beautiful state.
SUBSCRIBEThe old stereotype, perpetuated by water parks, poetry and the occasional country-music song, rings true in this case: Rivers really are lazy.
Greeley is piecing together a plan to restore the Cache la Poudre River. It’s intended to be bold and visionary. But the ethos of the plan, at least so far, appears to be to get out of its way.
“Ultimately,” said Victoria Leonhardt, a senior urban transportation planner for the city of Greeley leading the project, “we just want to give the Poudre more room.”
For decades, cities across Colorado abused rivers, using them as dumps, funneling them into canals and surrounding them with concrete and bridges. Greeley wasn’t any better, and as a result, the length of the Poudre decreased by 15%, or about 2 miles. Squeezing the river increased its speed, and that led to erosion, killed much of the aquatic life and, most of all, led to flooding. It also limited, if downright evaporated, the chances of any recreation.
“I don’t want to say we ignored it,” Leonhardt said. “But as a whole, I felt like we turned our backs on the river.”
Greeley hopes to change that by, among other things, reconnect the river with its historic flood plains, giving it room to spread out, increasing its length and creating spawning beds for fish, wetland ponds, boulder clusters, gravel bars and places where the public can spend some time with it, if not in it.
The last part would likely be the most exciting to the general public and would resemble the efforts of many cities across Colorado to make their rivers a place where people can play. Even Greeley’s neighbors, including Windsor and Fort Collins, have made recent improvements to incorporate the Poudre in its recreation plans. That fact alone is a reason Greeley officials want to improve their section of the Poudre. The city hopes to focus those efforts on the downtown area for now, from 35th Avenue east to U.S. 85.
“The recreation piece is huge,” Leonhardt said. “It could be a destination-type attraction or amenity. We want to make sure people stay in Greeley to recreate, and ideally, others could come here.”
Windsor’s Poudre River park
Way back in 2015, Eric Lucas joined Windsor as the town’s public services manager and immediately wondered why the town wasn’t doing more with the Poudre. Four years later, residents wondered the same thing in a survey. That was all the impetus he needed.
The $1.5 million project, called the Eastman Park River Experience, uses the Poudre as a mile-long float trip as well as a river plaza where you can dip your toes. The project was so well received that Windsor completed a $4 million expansion in October.
“We see cars parked there daily and people using the boardwalk to engage with the Poudre River,” said Lucas, now the deputy town manager.
It’s essentially a live lazy river, like the kind you’ll find in modern swimming pools, without the chlorine. The city offers tubes you can rent for $5 and there is valet service via a golf cart so you don’t have to walk the mile back.
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3:00 AM MDT on Jun 22, 2021Windsor doesn’t really want residents to float in the Poudre beyond the boundaries of Eastman Park, and the town discourages residents from using the river if it is flowing too fast, as it does during the peak, typically in early June. The city doesn’t necessarily close the river, as it’s not an amusement park, but it won’t offer tubes to rent when it gets to 1,700 cubic feet per second. (The town will list the days it is closed on its website.)
Fort Collins took a more aggressive approach with the Poudre River Whitewater Park, which has two so-called drop structures that act as a whitewater wave for kayakers, tubers and optimistic stand-up paddleboarders. The feature was built to take advantage of the Poudre’s stronger spring and early summer flows, so the wave isn’t gnarly or even all that fun most of the year. But other features of the park are, including an accessible riverbank, a plaza that overlooks the river and a bridge that connects residents to the Poudre Trail.
The park also restores the river to a more natural state after years of abuse. This is a general theme throughout Colorado, as more than 30 cities and towns have restored and refurbished their rivers to make them part of their communities after essentially treating them like the bad parts of town parents warn their kids to avoid.
A photo of the Poudre River as it travels just east of the so-called “Red Barn” entrance point off 71st Avenue. This is a old photo and a good example of how the river can erode a bank: The trail recently underwent some major repairs after part of it was washed away from flooding events such as the one in 2013. The repairs also gave the river more room to spread out in case it becomes swollen from heavy rains in the future. (City of Greeley photo)Greeley’s still putting together a plan, so Leonhardt can’t say or even know what it could do as far as recreation, other than encouraging a chance for residents to splash around in it or fish. Tubing would be fun, she admits, but unavailable year-round. Paddleboarding seems likely.
Colorado has more human-made whitewater features than anywhere else in the country, said Nik White, the access and conservation director at Colorado Whitewater and the owner of Whitewater Workshop, a company that teaches whitewater paddling in Golden. These include the Buena Vista Whitewater Park, the largest in the state, as well as water parks in Pueblo, Montrose, Gunnison and Gore Canyon. Many others are calmer versions that use rivers for recreation, including Denver’s Confluence Park.
Golden is another good example of a town using a river to attract people downtown. The Clear Creek Whitewater Park draws thousands of tubers and, occasionally, kayakers every summer, as well as kids who like to play in the calmer eddies.
The crowds sometimes make it difficult for White to operate his business in Golden: He has a hard time using Clear Creek to teach his classes. But he also prefers people using the rivers to ignoring them.
“The more we get people out on rivers,” White says, “the more they become advocates of them.”
People tubing on Clear Creek float past people enjoying the water on a part of the river that has been designed to welcome visitors on Aug. 28, 2024. (Andy Colwell, Special to The Colorado Sun)Open the floodgates
At a gathering to show off plans for the Poudre, or at least the concept of a plan, Mike Moreno peered down at the large map that covered a quarter of the floor in his restaurant and general store in downtown Greeley. He’s been frustrated more than once in the past decade by flooding downtown and in his store.
“I like the plan,” said Moreno. “I’m all for water not coming here.”
Elisa Gutierrez, a designer for the Denver office of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates, shows off concepts for the Poudre River on a map of the landscape to Mike Moreno, the owner of Moreno’s General Store in downtown Greeley. The city recently gathered feedback from residents at the store. (Dan England, Special to The Colorado Sun)When Greeley officials took a look at Federal Emergency Management Agency flood maps, a tool that helps cities determine flood plains, or areas that have a 1% chance of being flooded within a 100-year period, they saw trouble. There’s a decent chunk of land at risk, Leonhardt said, something Greeley found out the hard way during the flood of 2013 and other events.
“We have big problems,” she said, “and the river is part of that.”
The Poudre, indeed, is “on people’s radars” more after 2013, said Elisa Gutierrez, a landscape designer for the Denver office of Michael Van Valkenburgh Associates. No revamping of the Poudre can guarantee that flooding won’t occur, but redesigning or removing some of the infrastructure that surrounds it could really help reduce the chances.
“Giving it some breathing room, so it can move on its own,” Gutierrez said of the plans. “We’re essentially hoping to give it a flood plain back.”
This is another reason why cities across the world are rethinking their rivers, Gutierrez said, as lively, accessible spaces, one of Greeley’s goals.
“There are countless projects,” she said, who calls the Poudre project “her baby.” “It’s great to see. The people here have never seen a healthy Poudre.”
A watercolor vision for the Poudre River by Elisa Gutierrez, a landscape designer helping Greeley develop the project.They will likely have to wait awhile longer, as the city hopes to gather more feedback from residents before unveiling a design this summer. The Greeley City Council could vote on it as soon as this fall. There are obstacles to overcome, including the fact that the river runs next to a lot of private property, something that held up the city from completing the Poudre Trail for many years. Water rights, as a result, are an issue. And there are gravel pits as well.
There’s also finding money to pay for it.
The city, however, is encouraged by the recent Northern Water settlement that will create a $100 million fund for Poudre River restoration and recreation projects between Poudre Canyon and the confluence with the Big Thompson River at the eastern edge of Greeley. Leonhardt calls the deal “great timing,” given that the money could be a good source of funding. Greeley’s report said the city was confident it could find grants and private partnerships to help pay for any projects identified through the planning process.
Leonhardt, however, wants to see specific projects emerge from this hard look at the Poudre as soon as the visionary plan is adopted.
“There’s momentum that comes out of a planning process, where you demonstrate the value of a project,” she said. “I’d love to see something identified as soon as possible.”
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