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Last Chance for Codornices Creek
Despite eight months of consensus-based planning among creek advocates, recreationalists, the cities of Berkeley and Albany, and U.C. Berkeley students and planners, a design for Codornices Creek combining creek restoration, fish protection and the creation of new student facilities continues to falter. The scapegoat for the project's problems seems to be the 3,000-foot stretch of creek between San Pablo Avenue and the railroad tracks near the Bay (crossing largely University-owned land), but some say the true culprit is poor planning and the University's refusal to acknowledge what creek restoration really means.
To creek experts hired to come up with a design, namely the Waterways Restoration Institute, restoration means creating sinuous new meanders in straightened sections, pools and riffles for threatened steelhead, and a wide swath of native riparian vegetation along the creek banks. But University planner Jackie Bernier questions the feasibility of full restoration: "It took 70 years to get the creek in its current condition. It's going to take a while to fix it. Everyone wants this wild and woolly creek but I don't know if that's going to be possible here."
One thing sitting in the path of a planned meander is some 1960s barracks-style housing. Although the University would like to replace it with new, seismically safer structures, many students are unhappy at the prospect of paying higher rents. Then there's the even bigger problem of the planned replacement housing itself, which would sit even closer to the restored creek. "The real crime is that these proposed buildings are governing the future of the creek," says the Urban Creeks Council's Carole Schemmerling. Giving the creek adequate room would only require realigning one building by 30 feet and another by 40 feet, and moving 10 parking spaces, she says.
Nor is the University giving a proposed trail enough room, according to creek and trail advocates. Apparently, the University has refused to provide project designers with a sufficient right-of-way for both the creek and a hoped-for trail along its banks connecting to the Bay Trail and the Ohlone Greenway. Other mid-meander blockades include a large maintenance shed and a play yard behind a day-care center. Creek advocates say the shed and play lot can easily be relocated, but the University claims it cannot afford to move the shed. As for relocating the play area, a laundry facility that sits just north of it would have to be relocated first, says Bernier. "These are issues we can't deal with in the short term, but that doesn't mean we're not going to try to find solutions."
If the shed and play lot are not moved, the creek will be confined to a narrow right-of-way, requiring structural reinforcement and preventing a completely natural restoration, not to mention precluding much-needed flood control benefits of the planned meanders. U.C. Professor Tom Dudley says the semi-structural approach often turns out to be a problem for restoration projects because the riparian corridor is too narrow. "What is needed here is a comprehensive analysis of how to re-establish the best, most extensive, aquatic and riparian system."
With all of the issues that have arisen, the project will likely undergo further environmental review, according to Bill Knight with the Berkeley Department of Public Works. Knight says that in addition to that review, many of the stakeholders hope to "get a bigger purview" on the project (by involving the U.C. Chancellor's office if necessary). "I think decisions have been made at a particular level by people with limited authority," says Knight.
Contact: Bill Knight (510)665-3426, Waterways Restoration Institute (510)848-2211, or Jackie Bernier (510)642-0167
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