Swampland to dirt and
back again-Kissimmee River Canal Project
Henry Disston and five associates entered into a land
reclamation contract with the State of Florida in January 1881. The contract
stipulated that Disston’s Atlantic and
Gulf Coast Canal and Okeechobee Land Company would be deeded half of whatever
land it reclaimed around Lake Okeechobee, the Kissimmee, Caloosahatchee and
Miami Rivers. Disston stood to gain up to twelve million acres with his
drainage contract. Following finical difficulties of the State, Disston
tentatively agreed to purchase outright four million acres of the land for 25 cents
per acre. It made him the largest single landowner in the United States. They
saw no value in the land as swamp.
The
last word in ignorance is the man who says of an animal or plant: “What good is
it?” If the land mechanism as a whole is good, then every part is good, whether
we understand it or not. - Aldo
Leopold A Sand County Almanac
The key to Disston's Florida plans was a massive dredging
effort to drain the Kissimmee River floodplain that flows into Lake Okeechobee,
to remove the surface water in the Everglades and the surrounding lands
regardless of season. The canals were
engineered to guide the overflow of Lake Okeechobee into the St. Lucie River
and then into the Atlantic Ocean in the east; the Caloosahatchee River overflow
was directed to the Gulf of Mexico in the west, and eventually canals were to
be constructed south through the Everglades. Disston began with smaller
dredging operations to link Lake Tohopekaliga, Lake Cypress, Lake Hatchineha,
and Lake Kissimmee near Orlando; straighten the Kissimmee River, and to connect
Lake Okeechobee with the Caloosahatchee River. Although he never finished his
canal plans for Lake Okeechobee, and the Everglades remained relatively
unaffected by the structures he intended to drain them, at the time he was
formally credited with reclaiming large portions of land and generally
improving the drainage of peninsular Florida.
On May 1st, 1896, Disston was found dead at age 51. The
official coroner's report stated that he died of heart disease in bed. His family
had no interest in Florida and creditors foreclosed on his Florida mortgage
four years after his death. In 1954 Congress authorized the canalization of the
Kissimmee River. From 1962 to 1970 the Army Corps of Engineers dredged the C-38
Canal down the Kissimmee valley, shortening the water flow distance from Lake
Kissimmee to Lake Okeechobee by 53 miles. This realized Disston’s dream of
draining the river basin’s wetlands. Cattle farms and housing projects popped
up almost 60 years after Disston died. Others took up his cause to drain the
swamp, but those projects are also being reversed or at least reconsidered.
It has since been
realized that this project damaged the river, with the faster water flow
leading to major environmental problems in the Kissimmee Valley and Lake
Okeechobee. After the river channel was straightened, 50,000 acres of
floodplain below Lake Kissimmee dried out. This reduced the quality of waterfowl
habitat and lowered the number of herons, egrets and wood storks. Before
channelization the Kissimmee basin was not a significant source of pollution
for Lake Okeechobee. By the 1970’s the river contributed about 25% of the nitrogen
and phosphorus flowing into the lake and the Everglades beyond.
Efforts to restore the Kissimmee River to its original flow
were approved by Congress in 1992.
By 2006 the South Florida Water Management
District had acquired enough land along the river and in the upper chain of
lakes to complete the proposed restoration.
The Kissimmee River Restoration Project will return historic flow to 40
miles of the river's previous channel and restore an additional 40 square miles
of floodplain ecosystem. The restoration project is a 50-50 partnership between
the South Florida Water Management District and the U.S. Army Corps of
Engineers and is currently projected to be complete by 2015.
Wildlife is already returning to the restored sections of
river. When the normal seasonal flooding began again the accumulated muck and
smothering aquatic weeds were flushed out. Sandbars reemerged in the river
channel. Encroaching dry land trees began dying back. Once dormant plants have
now begun to reestablish themselves. Flooding and continuous flow has increased
levels of dissolved oxygen in the water. This creates near perfect conditions
for aquatic invertebrates, which has boosted fish populations, which in turn
has led to a rise in bird and alligator populations. The entire food chain has benefited from the initial steps of restoration. Three construction phases are
now complete, and continuous water flow has been reestablished to 24 miles of
the meandering Kissimmee River. Seasonal rains and flows now inundate the
floodplain in the restored areas.
Everglades National Park, Big Cypress National Preserve,
Allen David Broussard Catfish Creek SP, Lake Kissimmee SP, Kissimmee Prairie
Preserve SP, and 36 Wildlife Management Areas belonging to the South Florida
Water Management District are in the Kissimmee River or greater Everglades
water basins.
Beyond the Kissimmee River restoration, the Comprehensive
Everglades Restoration Plan provides a framework to restore, protect and preserve the water
resources of central and southern Florida. Starting near Orlando and including
the Everglades, it covers 16 counties over an 18,000-square-mile area.
The Plan
was approved in the Water Resources Development Act of 2000. It includes more
than 60 elements, will take more than 30 years to construct and the current
cost estimate is $9.5 billion. The goal of CERP is to capture fresh water that
now flows unused into the ocean and gulf and redirect it to the environmental
areas that need it most. The majority of the water will be devoted to
environmental restoration that is reviving a dying ecosystem. The remaining
water will benefit cities and farmers by enhancing water supplies for the south
Florida economy.
Tamiami Trail
The Tamiami Trail is the southernmost 264 miles of U.S.
Highway 41 from State Road 60 in Tampa to U.S. Route 1 in Miami. The 165-mile
north–south section extends from Tampa to Naples. Then it becomes an east–west
road, crossing the Everglades and forming part of the northern border of
Everglades National Park on its way to Miami. Construction on the north–south
section began in 1915.After Lee County ran out of money for the project, and
some political end-fighting between developers Captain Jaudon and Barron
Collier, the east-west route was changed to the south and then changed back in
1925.
The final section of the Trail was completed in April 1928.The Tamiami
Trail took 13 years and cost $8 million to build.
The Bay City Walking Dredge
# 489 was built in Michigan in
1924. It was purchased by a construction company controlled by real-estate
developer Barron Collier. Collier had
pledged to help Lee County complete its portion of the Tamiami Trail because he
owned land and businesses that would profit from the new route. Collier County was formed from the Southern
portion of Lee County and was named in honor of him.
This dredge did not need railroad tracks, rather it was
designed to “Walk” over wet and swampy land where wheeled or tracked vehicles
would bog down. There were two sets of
shoes that would alternately support the weight of the dredge and then be
winched forward. The steam engine that powered the one cubic yard dredge bucket
would be used to pull cables through pulleys to slide the feet forward. The
dredge is held together mostly by bolts, and there are very few welds on the
machine. The crew would blast canals on either side of the path of the trail. The
dredge would then scoop up the debris rock and pile it to make a roadbed.
The Bay City Walking Dredge worked on the Tamiami Trail 18
hours a day from 1927 thru 1928. Supervisors Earl Ivey and Meece Ellis worked the dredge crew
from Blackwater River to the Northwest to Belle Meade Crossing. After the project it was stored on land owned
by Meece Ellis not far from where it sits today. The dredge was moved to a county park about
1940. In 1947 that county park became Collier-Seminole State Park.
In 1993 The Bay City Walking Dredge was named a National
Historic Engineering Landmark by the American Society of Mechanical Engineers.
It is the last known Dredge of its type. It is on display near the entrance of
Collier Seminole State Park.
In 1928, the Tamiami Trail was considered a feat of
engineering, although no one considered the potential damage to the Everglades.
It has acted as a dam to block water flow from Lake Okeechobee to Florida Bay.
As a result the Everglades has had its water flow greatly diminished over the
years, resulting in a devastating effect on the ecology of the region. In the
1990’s a few canals were filled and additional culverts were constructed under
US 41 to help facilitate water flow. Yet this was only a partial solution to
the problems of the Everglades and the Tamiami Trail. In 2011 the US Army Corps
of Engineers began building a 5000-foot-long elevated bridge near Shark Slough
in Everglades National Park. The remaining roadbed has been improved to allow
higher water levels adjacent to the road for more water flow through the
culverts that are already in place.
Shark River Slough is one of the Everglades’ deepest and most important
water passageways. The bridge will be an
important first step in returning the historic water sheet flow through parched
Everglades National Park and into Florida Bay. It will be beneficial to
wildlife by reducing habitat fragmentation and preventing road kill. The
project will create jobs and increase tourism while raising Everglades
awareness at the same time. Increased fresh water flow may also help protect
the Everglades from salt water intrusion if sea levels rise in the future.
Everglades National Park (Site # 9107), Big Cypress National
Preserve (Site # 9111), Ten Thousand Islands National Wildlife Refuge (Site
# 9329 ), Collier-Seminole State Park
(Site # 8124), Picayune Strand State Forest (Site # 8016) are located along the
Tamiami Trail.
A true turning point for development in the Everglades came
in 1969 when a replacement airport was proposed as Miami International Airport
outgrew its capacities. Dade County Port
Authority bought 39 square miles of land in the Big Cypress Swamp without consulting
the water management district, the management of Everglades National Park or
the Department of the Interior. Park management learned of the official
agreement to build the jetport from The Miami Herald the day it was announced.
The new jetport was planned to be larger than O'Hare, Dulles, JFK, and LAX
airports combined. The location chosen
was along Tamiami Trail 6 miles north of the Everglades National Park.
The
water management authority went on the offensive and brought the jetport
proposal to national attention by mailing letters about it to 100 conservation
groups. The jetport was intended to support a community of a million people and
employ 60,000. When studies indicated
the proposed jetport would create 4 million gallons of raw sewage a day and
thousands of tons of jet engine pollutants a year, the national media started
to pay attention. The 78-year-old author Marjory Stoneman Douglas was persuaded
to go on tour to give hundreds of speeches against it.
President Nixon
established Big Cypress National Preserve in his Special Message to the
Congress Outlining the 1972 Environmental Program. Following the jetport
proposition, restoration of the Everglades became an international priority. In
the 1970’s the Everglades were declared an International Biosphere Reserve and
a World Heritage Site by UNESCO, and a Wetland of International Importance by
the Ramsar Convention. The single runway Dade Training and Transitional airport
is all that stands on the site today, and can be seen from the Big Cypress
National Preserve Welcome Center.
Excerpt from "Boardwalks and Long Walks" posted by the author Will Holcomb
Visit us on Facebook at "Boardwalks and Longwalks"
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