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NHI works closely with municipalities, water districts, irrigation districts, flood control districts, regulators, creek groups, schools, and other stakeholders to identify opportunities to improve the management of urban streams for ecological benefits. NHI brings technical, cultural, and project management expertise to these collaborations. Urban streams and watersheds present particular challenges for aquatic ecosystem restoration projects. Complicating factors include non-point source pollution, streambed channelization, flood regulation facilities control, the large number of stakeholders and the dense infrastructure of the city. Yet even within these highly-constrained systems, successful restoration measures can be devised to benefit fisheries, aquatic species, and urban inhabitants who enjoy improved water quality and the recreation and educational opportunities that clean, green spaces provide.
Restoration strategies depend on the physical, institutional, and historical setting of any given watershed. NHI’s Urban Streams Program includes projects that attempt to identify and retrofit restoration projects into a dense urban fabric of heavily-urbanized and rapidly-urbanizing watersheds. We also identify and protect important water resources in rural watersheds that face imminent development. NHI shepherds urban stream projects from assessment and problem identification through project implementation and adaptive management.
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