FALMOUTH – Falmouth Selectmen were recently treated to an update regarding the town’s progress on the Coonamessett River restoration project.
Phase one of the endeavor will center on removing the lower dam, as well as several feet of sand from the river bed, and reorienting a portion of the river.
The large scale project will lengthen and make the river more sinuous across three bogs by removing a series of dams, finally allowing for a 2.2 mile stretch of free-flowing river.
“It’s restoring the river to a much more natural setting,” said Betsy Gladfelter, a member of the Falmouth Conservation Commission and lead coordinator on the project.
The first phase also includes the restoration of lower bog and the removal. Gladfelter said the work is expected to take about six to eight weeks to complete.
The project’s second phase will see the removal of middle dam and the culvert beneath John Parker Road.
“We’re hoping that it will benefit many of the plants and animals in the system, but especially the fish – the alewives, the blueback herring and, it seems like everybody’s favorite, the brook trout,” Gladfelter said.
Gladfelter said the project should help with the area’s nitrogen issues.
“It’ll be restoring the activities of the organisms in the soil to be able to mitigate the nitrogen that comes into the system,” she said.
The project went through a lengthy permitting process that required authorizations from the US Army Corps of Engineers, the Division of Marine Fisheries and other organizations.
By DAVID BEATTY, CapeCod.com NewsCenter
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