Bear Creek Lower Meadow Reach Restoration
The Bear Creek Lower Meadow Reach Restoration Project was a creek and meadow restoration project located on the lower reach of Bear Creek in Placer County CA. Bear Creek is a tributary to the Middle Truckee River and drains the Bear Creek Watershed Basin of Alpine Meadows. The project was a partnership between the Truckee River Watershed Council (TRWC) and the United States Forest Service (USFS) Tahoe National Forest (TNF) as defined in the Bear Creek Watershed Assessment.
The project goals consisted of improving the hydrologic processes by restoring floodplain connectivity, improving groundwater storage, prolonging base stream flows, enhancing critical habitat, and reducing erosion and sedimentation to lower Total Maximum Daily Loading (TMDL).
Hanford worked in unison with the project Design Consultant Balance Hydrologics and the USFS TNF implementing the design through a field fit process. Bear Creek was active and bypassed through a diversion and dewatering system for the duration of the project. Implementation consisted of raising the channel bed to encourage overbank flow while managing bank erosion, utilizing large wood for bank stability and habitat enhancement, construction of engineered riffles to decrease flow velocities and aid aggradation, re-engage secondary flow paths and relict channels to enhance connectivity and filter fine sediment, increase in stream wood to trap sediment and enhance aquatic habitat, and the installation of debris jam beaver dam analogs to entice beaver activity in the meadow.