LAND & WATER MAGAZINE

Appleton Stormwater ManagementA National Model

Land & Water Magazine

Bobbing and flapping on the pond, two pair of bufflehead ducks lift off the water as you walk toward the shore. They’re decorative and uncommon, especially in a city. A muskrat ripples into her shoreland home beneath the bank. Bluebirds flit by and raucous redwing blackbirds protest. The redtail hawk watches from above and a pair of sandhill cranes stalk warily at the far end of the long waterway. Western chorus frogs go silent as you approach.Here, in the City of Appleton, Wisconsin, stormwater management is different.

Stormwater Management, Naturally

No, they’re not creating a Northwoods Resort. Flood reduction and stormwater management is the main issue, of course, just like in your community. But the City of Appleton has embraced a “living with nature” mindset that blends multiple benefits into the engineering of its stormwater management system. In the mid-90s – 1994-1995 – the city chose to build its first regional

stormwater management pond, along with a significant buffer area, vegetated with native prairie and wetland communities. Today, Appleton has more than 30 regional stormwater management facilities with ponds and upland buffers and bioswales that move surface water away from developed areas into natural waters. These not only manage the volume of stormwater but also improve water quality, recharge groundwater aquifers…and create wildlife habitats and beautiful places and natural environments people enjoy. Places to see buffleheads, sandhill cranes, bluebirds and hawks.

Parklands, Really

Sometimes, we call these places “parks”. In Appleton, they call them Ballard Road Pond and Holland Road Pond, and other road-oriented names. Specifically, their function is not to be a “park”. It’s to be a stormwater management facility. Many, however, serve the dual purpose of public access parklands that contribute to the city’s open space natural areas. When possible, they’re connected with trails that provide public

access to the natural areas that buffer the ponds, as in the case with the Ballard Road and Holland Road facilities. These 30+ acre pond and upland buffer facilities are linked by Apple Creek and the sinuous paved walking/biking/roller-blading trail that follows it. “We’re managing 34 stormwater management areas today, vegetated with native prairie and wetland species, and we’re building three more facilities this year,” said Peter Neuberger, P.E., civil engineer for the City of Appleton Department of Public Works. “These landscapes are interesting and beautiful. We like the concept that we’re providing pockets of biological diversity – both in vegetation and wildlife – within an urban area. From our trail system, you can see herons and waterfowl and other interesting wildlife. It’s something you’re not used to seeing in an urban area. Something that people living in the city might not otherwise get a chance to see.”

Challenges in Appleton

Appleton, Wisconsin, with its northern climate and clay soils, presented ecological challenges to establishing native vegetation communities in stormwater management facilities. The city, in fact, is on the northern edge of the historic prairie region. “They’ve got dense, heavy clay soils, so we’ve developed different seeding mixes for them over the years,” said John Larson,Ph.D., a senior ecologist with Applied Ecological Services, Inc, (AES) which manages the city’s stormwater management facilities. “In the upland prairie buffers, the forbs (wildflowers) have done better than the native grasses which just take longer to get established. That’s unusual. “But the clay soils hold a lot of moisture and stay cool longer, especially in the spring, so they tend to favor cool-season grasses and it can be later in the

Project Manager, Josh Lapointe stands next to the tall wetland vegetation that surrounds the detention ponds in the city of Appleton, WI.

Land & Water Magazine

season that the native grasses gain an advantage.” Because of the clay soils and cool climate, AES has recommended installation of higher rates of grass seed for the prairie buffer areas than would be normal. “The wetland emergent plants have established really well – because of the nutrients bound up in the clay soils,” Larson said. “We plant them in July/August, and by the next year they’re dog-hair thick. The only problem, really, is muskrats. So we cage those plants during the establishment period. Wildlife habitat, in fact, is one of the goals.”

Establishing Vegetation…and Expectations

“We’re a little far north,” said Neuberger, “so there is greater competition from cool-season species and we have to make sure we prep the site by herbiciding and tillage to get those competing seeds out of the matrix. We’ve got a pretty good track record on that. “We’ve been doing this for several years now, so we understand that the cool, wet clays prolong the establishment of native plants, and

because we’ve learned that, we’re better able to provide realistic expectations to our residents. “There’s definitely an educational component to this approach, because it can easily take five years for the native landscapes to really look good. We’ve learned how to execute our projects to get quick establishment, without a lot of competition from the cool-season species so they don’t look like a weedy mess, and we find the neighbors are pretty accepting of the approach.” An important lesson the city has learned is that simply planting prairie and wetland species, and walking away without ongoing maintenance, is not a formula for success. Since 2005, Appleton has contracted with AES to conduct monitoring and maintenance of their stormwater management facilities. The work includes installation of seed, plants and erosion matting on new sites, and prescribed burning, spot herbiciding and mowing on established landscapes. This year, weather permitting, AES expects to burn more than 90 acres of prairie, according to AES project manager Josh Kraemer, while managing roughly 120 acres in all.

While in the field, AES crews have found ample opportunities to interact with neighbors and the trail-walking public – nearly always receiving positive feedback – and these have been valuable opportunities to help with the education of the community, said AES contracting division manager Joshua Lapointe. “Our long-time relationship with the city has also allowed us to walk the properties with city staff and help educate them about the species, and the process of installing and maintaining the landscapes,” Lapointe said. “The staff interaction was important to show them what we were doing and how it works, which in turn allowed them to educate their constituents. It’s something I’ve tried to emulate with other clients on other projects.”

Lessons Learned

Early on, Lapointe said, AES found that the C350 erosion blankets being specified were too heavy to allow the native seedlings to break through, so he recommended a thinner blanket that would hold the soil until the deep-rooted native plants took over and stabilized the soil. Seed mixes have also been modified to overcome the challenges posed by the dense soils, and to beef up the content of colorful wildflowers which adds much appreciated aesthetic appeal, according to Neuberger. When muskrats first invaded the pond environments and began damaging the wetland emergent plants, AES started caging the shoreline plant communities to protect them. This has worked well to prevent damages from goose predation, according to Larson, and while the persistent muskrats still do some damage, the practice has helped. “The muskrats like the emergent vegetation zones, but the problem is really more of a challenge to us rather than it being viewed negatively by the public,” Neuberger said. “Different people interpret the

Contracting crews use coir (coconut fiber) logs to stablize the shoreline.

Land & Water Magazine

wildlife component in different ways. These landscapes bring in frogs and invertebrates, and lots of birds, which people generally view positively.” Aquatic invasives such as European water milfoil, curly leaf pondweed and of course algae require ongoing maintenance, according to Kraemer, but overall, the native prairie and wetland plants provide infiltration and other significant benefits to water quality. Neuberger pointed out that the tall vegetation helps greatly to reduce goose populations which in itself is an important benefit to water quality. “These ponds can be a huge draw for Canada geese and they can present a big problem, to the point that they can make it difficult to use the shoreline if they’re congregating in large numbers,” he said. “We can’t entirely avoid the goose issues, but the native vegetation keeps their numbers down as they’ll usually go elsewhere to find mowed turfgrass areas around ponds in other areas.”

The Cost – Benefit Equation

The City of Appleton has been listed as one of the Top 100 best places to live in America by Money Magazine’s 2010 review, and it has always considered itself a leader in establishing a high quality of life for its residents, Neuberger said. “We were one of the first cities in Wisconsin to establish a stormwater utility, to build regional stormwater facilities and to use native vegetation in our landscaping,” he said. “We didn’t start using native landscaping because it seemed like a trendy or cutting-edge thing to do. Sue Olson was the project engineer in our first stormwater pond projects and she, along with former Public Works Director Dave Vaclavik, made the effort to research and gain support for the concept.” The cost to establish the native landscapes is higher than installation of conventional turfgrass landscapes, Neuberger readily admits, but the

multiple benefits to the community are viewed as outweighing the additional expense, he said. “We know we’re getting better infiltration which helps reduce stormwater volumes and flows, and recharges groundwater resources. We don’t do formal monitoring, but we know our water quality is improved because of it. We’re adding to the biological diversity within the city, both in vegetation and wildlife. And we get aesthetic benefits. These landscapes are interesting and beautiful. “Plus, we’re seeing reduced maintenance costs as the prairies

become more mature. We’ve been adding one to two ponds per year for the past decade, and our maintenance budget has held steady for several years even as we’re significantly increasing our pond inventory. So the unit cost for maintenance of each pond has decreased.” Lapointe, for one, shares in the community’s conclusion that the cost-benefit equation favors the natural landscaping approach. “I would love to live in that city,” he said. “Their restorations are really looking nice, and I’m very impressed with their parklands.”

The Appleton Stormwater Detention Ponds have provided much-needed habitat for rare birds – including Sandhill Cranes (pictured).

The stormwater detention areas have also provided habitat for many threatened and endangered species.