Fanno Creek Restoration, Denney Rd. to Hall Blvd.

Project Description

A major tributary to the Tualatin River, Fanno Creek flows through nearly 17 miles of urban residential, industrial, commercial, and park land. The popular Fanno Creek Greenway Trail allows runners, bikers, hikers, and birdwatchers to follow much of the creek’s course. A portion of the creek that flowed between Denney Road and Hall Boulevard was straightened to make way for agriculture. Over time, the straightened reach became severely degraded, with eroding banks, reduced water quality, diminished wildlife habitat, and impaired fish passage.

As part of a larger effort to improve the ecological function of Fanno Creek, Clean Water Services, the regional water resources utility, turned to Biohabitats for help in transforming the degraded reach into a stable and naturally functioning stream channel.

The restoration involved realigning 1,000 LF of the channel and reconnecting it to its floodplain, removing a poorly performing culvert and replacing it with a new bridge, lowering a sanitary sewer line, and realigning a portion of the Fanno Creek Trail. More than 10,000 CY of material was excavated to create a new channel for Fanno Creek. The entire 5 acre site was reseeded with native grass and wildflowers and was then planted with 5,000 live stakes and 10,000 bare root native trees and shrubs. Infrastructure was protected with encapsulated soil lifts, logs and small amounts of rock.