San Rafael, CA – A County of Marin project starts Friday, August 26, to help migrating endangered salmon navigate a San Geronimo Valley creek and create habitat within the Lagunitas Watershed that is hampered by summer drought conditions.
A 'before' photo of the fish passage box culvert on San Geronimo Creek in Woodacre.
The fish passage project on San Geronimo Creek in Woodacre has a budget of $595,000, including $235,000 from a California Department of Fish and Wildlife grant secured by the County’s
Department of Public Works, and $360,000 of County funding as a match. Glissman Excavating Inc. of Loomis, Calif., was awarded a $548,720 contract, and engineers estimate a completion date by the end of October.
“This is the same contractor that built the Lansdale Fish Passage Project in San Anselmo in 2012, and we were very happy with how that went,” said DPW Senior Planner Kallie Kull. “Glissman is very experienced in creek restoration.”
The concrete box culvert under Railroad Avenue in San Geronimo was built 60 years ago and is considered a jump barrier for salmon because of the eroded conditions of the creek downstream of the culvert. The new plans focus on improvement of fish passage through the culvert and the construction of deep pools created by log and rock structures to be installed in the channel. The project aims to improve fish habitat during low-flow drought conditions for 365 linear feet downstream from Railroad Avenue.
The San Geronimo Valley is the last undammed headwaters of Lagunitas Creek and is considered critical coho salmon spawning and juvenile rearing habitat. In response to concerns about the effects of further development in the watershed on coho salmon populations, County DPW prepared a San Geronimo Valley Salmon Enhancement Plan in 2010. Removing fish passage barriers was one of the high-priority recommendations in the plan. The County initiated a fish passage program in 2005; to date DPW has restored fish passage at 10 locations, eight of them in the San Geronimo Valley where protection of endangered coho salmon is critical.
There are no planned road closures during the project.
County DPW offers more information online about its fish passage program at www.marinwatersheds.org.