The largest of four Great Lakes Restoration Initiative grant projects intended to reduce sediment in the Poplar River—the Ullr Tightline Project—is going to start this spring.
Edwin E. Thoreson Inc. is under contract to complete the project. It will involve installing a 130,000-gallon collection basin, 1,050 feet of pipe, a 10,000- gallon concrete energy dissipater, and riprap and re-vegetating the area. The cost is projected at $300,000, with $30,000 of that amount coming from another grant. The system is expected to reduce sediment by 90 tons per year and handle a 100-year rainstorm.
The total grant of $588,979 for all four projects is for construction and does not cover the cost of engineering, grant administration, or project oversight. The work must be completed by September 2014.
The next project will be the Caribou Highlands Flowpath, budgeted at $253,963, which will address storm water runoff in numerous areas including runoff from Caribou Highlands and from a 4,000-foot Lutsen Mountains downhill ski run. It is expected to reduce sediment by 80 tons per year.
The Caribou Highlands Flowpath Project needed to be re-engineered as a result of research conducted by John Niebur of the University of Minnesota. When the grant application was submitted, Cook County Soil & Water Conservation District engineer Keith Anderson was available to do the required re-engineering, but he has become busy with other projects and another engineer needs to be hired. Lutsen Mountains has contributed to sediment-reduction projects that have already been done but will not have funds to help with this project right now. “We had a horrible winter,” said Lutsen Mountains Co-Owner Tom Rider. “Things are going to be very tight for us this summer.” The Poplar River Management Board is working on other sources of funding.
The final two projects will be improvements to Lower Eagle Mountain Road (reducing sediment by 75 tons per year) with $50,016 in grant funds and re-alignment, armoring, and re-vegetation along the Lower Mystery Mountain Flow Path (reducing sediment by 30 tons per year) with $15,000 in grant funds.
Comparison of data on sediment levels from 2001 to 2011 appear to indicate that sediment reduction efforts are significantly reducing the level of sediment in the Poplar River. Lutsen Mountains has been making efforts to reduce sediment in the river since 1998.
According to a report by the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency (MPCA), 55 percent of the total annual sediment load reaches the river in the months of April and May. An estimated 5,954 tons of sediment per year are believed to be coming from sources in the lower 2.73 miles of the river. Projects from here forward are expected to reduce annual sediment in the river by about 400 tons per year. MPCA’s goal is to reduce the sediment such that it never exceeds a certain amount of turbidity in a single measurement.
Projects planned but not yet funded are expected to cost $397,100 not including the cost of engineering, grant management, and project oversight.
A presentation on John Niebur’s research will be made via videoconference from 9:00 a.m. to noon on Tuesday, April 24 at the Cook County Courthouse.
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