Waterways

The Philadelphia Police Marine Unit does more than make rescues. Its 25 officers patrol 42 miles of waterways, aid drug-interdiction efforts, recover bodies, remove submerged vehicles, and otherwise ensure the safety of those who use the city's rivers, streams and reservoirs. They have even been known to help save a whale.

A special exception to construct improvements within a development's flood- prone district has been granted by the Edgmont Township Zoning Hearing Board subject to approval by the township engineer. The board voted, 3-0, Monday night to allow Dennis Meinhart, owner and developer of the Dream Valley subdivision, to enclose three waterways on the property and direct the flow into the nearby Springton Lake Reservoir. The approval is subject to the recommendations by township engineer Robert Plucienik, calling for the plans to show construction details for drainage structures and grates for safety purposes.

The Edgmont Township Zoning Hearing Board has heard an application for a special exception to construct improvements within a development's flood-prone district. Dennis Meinhart of Upper Providence, owner and developer of the proposed Dream Valley subdivision, asked the board Tuesday night for a special exception to enclose three waterways on the property and direct the flow into the nearby Springton Lake Reservoir. Dream Valley is a proposed 10-acre subdivision at Gradyville Road and Springton Lake Reservoir that is to be divided into nine lots for custom house.

Despite an act just passed by Congress that expressly forbids it, the Clinton administration has found a way to impose new rules to clean up waterways polluted by runoff from farms, forests and cities. The secret: President Clinton has ordered the Environmental Protection Agency to rush the rules to completion before the July 13 deadline for his signature making the bill a law. Involved is a type of runoff that the administration says pollutes 20,000 U.S. rivers, lakes and bays.

A coalition of clean-water groups yesterday released the names of 30 waterways that the groups have identified as most in need of "saving" from the effects of sprawl. In South Jersey, they pegged Rancocas Creek in Burlington County, Salem River in Salem County, Oldmans Creek in Gloucester County, and the Atlantic City Reservoir as those most in need of added protection. The other rivers, streams and reservoirs are concentrated in northern and central New Jersey. The waterways, including 14 reservoirs, deserve the highest level of protection under law because they are sources of drinking water, provide habitat for threatened and endangered species, and are in "sprawl belts," the groups said.

Diesel fuel from an underground supply line at a NJ Transit bus depot tainted about four miles of waterway in Washington and Gloucester Townships before emergency crews contained it Thursday. Roughly 26,000 gallons of diesel fuel from the ruptured underground line seeped into a storm drain and a stream leading to Grenloch Lake, which is in Washington Township and Gloucester Township, and into Blackwood Lake in Gloucester Township, said Lawrence Hajna, a spokesman with the state Department of Environmental Protection.

Eileen Rodriguez moved to Periwinkle Avenue in Langhorne 27 years ago because she loved the neighborhood on a bank of the Neshaminy Creek. But the storm-gorged waterway seeping ever closer to her doorstep Sunday morning provided a stark reminder - the creek didn't necessarily love her neighborhood back. "I've been through this before," she said as she and her husband, Steve, passed gawkers ambling down their closed street to survey damage left in Hurricane Irene's wake. "If they want waterfront property," he said, "I've got waterfront property they can buy. " Irene spared Southeastern Pennsylvania the knockout wallop from high winds and torrential rains some had predicted earlier in the week.

POINT PLEASANT, N.J. - He's no David Hasselhoff, and "Big Al" Wutkowski doesn't know any women who have one-piece red swimsuits. But the Point Pleasant sport fisherman and boater is becoming a real-life baywatcher. The American Littoral Society, a New Jersey shore environmental group, is enlisting him as its first Barnegat Bay Guardian, sworn to be the eyes and ears of environmentalists and law enforcement on the endangered waterway. He'll be out on the water looking for illegal or dangerous boating activities, sources of pollution, and unapproved development along the coast.

Declaring that South Jersey doesn't get its fair share of state protection for rivers and streams, environmental groups said yesterday that they would file legal petitions seeking to guard five waterways from sprawl and development. The state Department of Environmental Protection will have 60 days to consider granting Category One status - the highest level of protection - to the Toms River, Great Egg Harbor River, Salem River, Cedar Creek and Oldmans Creek after environmental advocates file their petitions this month.

CLARKSVILLE, Mo. - The fast-rising Mississippi River made travel difficult Saturday, on the water as well as for those simply trying to cross it. The Mississippi, Missouri, and other Midwestern rivers in at least six states have surged since heavy rains drenched the region over the last few days. At least two deaths were blamed on flash flooding and a third was suspected, and crews in Indiana were searching for a man whose car was swept away. The National Weather Service predicted what it characterized as major flooding on the Mississippi from the Quad Cities through just north of St. Louis by the weekend, with similar projections farther south into early in the week.

A battle is brewing on the banks of the Schuylkill - and the Monongahela, the Lackawanna, the Juniata, the Swatara, and the Kiskiminetas. Those six waterways are vying for the Pennsylvania River of the Year title, to be decided by a public online vote. As of Friday afternoon, with 6,830 votes cast, the Monongahela was in the lead (2,103 votes), with the Schuylkill lapping at its heels (1,762). The contest, funded by the state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources and run by the Pennsylvania Organization for Watersheds and Rivers, aims to raise awareness and appreciation of the state's waterways.

TRENTON - Sandy did more than just destroy several Jersey Shore communities - it made maps of the area's waterways obsolete and knocked watercraft all over the place. Col. Rick Fuentes, state police superintendent, said boaters need to understand that waterways in the central Shore region have been drastically altered and are filled with debris. An area shown on a map with water up to 18 feet deep may now be a sandbar, he said. Among the obstacles in the waterways are sunken and displaced vessels that were dislodged by the storm and winds.

By Jim Kenney With all Philadelphia's waterways officially classified as impaired, we need to use every tool we have to protect our drinking water and clean up our rivers and streams. One such tool is a development buffer around the city's waterways. A buffer of at least 50 feet is important to prevent flooding, filter pollution, and manage storm runoff. Why am I writing about this today? Because it's within City Council's power to protect our waterways with a 50-foot buffer, but some in our ranks may be trying to whittle a proposed buffer down to 25 feet.

THAT PLASTIC container you see floating in the Schuylkill? It will probably float away from Philly, but it's hardly gone forever. Along with other junk tossed into local waterways, it ends up in the ocean, where it breaks down into a soupy mush. Remember that next you have a hankering for sushi. Need a visual on this? The 5 Gyres Institute, a California nonprofit, is teaming up with United by Blue, a Philadelphia apparel company that is dedicated to cleaning up waterways around the country, to show people the effects of pollution during a presentation here Monday.

Environmentalists see a fight looming in City Council over a bit of business left over from last year's zoning code reform - a bill that would determine how close something can be built to the city's rivers and streams. Legislation introduced in September would create a 50-foot buffer, or "setback," around those bodies of water - less than the 100 feet environmental advocates preferred, but a number they saw as a compromise with builders. Now environmentalists fear Council will try to reduce the setback on the city's streams - basically, everything except the Schuylkill and Delaware Rivers - to 25 feet, a distance they say could harm already polluted waterways.

LAVALLETTE, N.J. - A marine scientist has sounded an alarm over the health of Barnegat Bay, one of New Jersey's most used recreational waterways and the source of $3 billion in annual tourist dollars. Michael Kennish of the Institute of Marine and Coastal Sciences at Rutgers University told lawmakers Monday that the bay was in danger of dying from unchecked runoff. The pollution sources include broken storm water basins and too much fertilizer. The pollution decreases oxygen levels, causing algae blooms and habitat loss.

New Jersey State Police plan to remove those white-and-red plastic "Slow Speed — No Wake" barrels from busy channels to "eliminate many of the unnecessary regulatory buoys that litter waterways," according to a statement touting the move. Admittedly, the buoys aren't the prettiest part of the landscape, but calling them litter is like calling stop signs garbage. They are essential to public safety. Eliminating warning buoys will only set the stage for more boating accidents, harm the fragile habitats of shore birds, plants, shellfish, and turtles, and require more frequent channel dredging.

Many of Pennsylvania's - and America's - locks and dams are on the brink of failure, according to the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, the agency charged with maintaining them. Conditions along the nation's 11,000-mile inland waterway system constitute "a crisis headed for a catastrophe," one high-ranking corps official said last month at an industry meeting in Washington. The precarious status of the waterway system stems from what government and industry officials agree is a broken method of maintaining and replacing aging locks and dams.

Cleanup efforts continued Friday around waterways in Gloucester and Washington Townships after an estimated 26,000 gallons of diesel fuel spilled from a NJ Transit bus terminal into a storm drain. The result of a bad fuel gasket on two storage tanks at the facility on Route 42, the spill panicked residents around Blackwood and Grenloch Lakes who awoke Thursday morning to the smell of diesel wafting off the water. "The cleanup is going to continue into next week," said Larry Hajna, a spokesman for the state Department of Environmental Protection.