Overview

The city has partnered with the Riley Purgatory Bluff Creek Watershed District to stabilize and improve a stretch of Upper Riley Creek. This project aims to provide an ecologically diverse stream reach that significantly reduces streambank erosion, provides diverse habitat layers, improves ecological functions, improves maintenance and inspection access, and enhances the public’s access and understanding of why stable stream systems are essential.

Surrounding land use has changed drastically in recent decades, from primarily agricultural land use to more industrial and residential land uses. This has increased the amount of impervious surface and runoff within the watershed, which has caused increased erosion in Upper Riley Creek. This portion of Upper Riley Creek, between Highway 5 and Lake Susan, has a channel bed, primarily sand and silt, with limited riffle/pool variability. The project will enhance the ecology of Upper Riley Creek by providing more significant stream depth variability, more channel bed substructure types, and varied channel velocities. The proposed project will remove accumulated debris from within the channel, reduce erosion, and improve water quality while improving natural stream habitat for aquatic organisms. Providing better floodplain connectivity for Upper Riley Creek enhances the surrounding riparian habitat and improves the ecological function through the corridor.

By establishing a stable stream corridor, the project will also help address the Minnesota Pollution Control Agency’s (MPCA’s) identified nutrient impairment in Lake Susan (which this reach of Riley Creek directly discharges into), Rice Marsh Lake, and Lake Riley. The lower portion of the project’s location in Lake Susan Park provides interpretive signage and future programming opportunities to educate the public on the importance of diverse stream corridors.

This project is currently in the planning phase.