Cities and towns across the Mississippi River basin have always needed to weather the environmental disasters associated with living along a river.
The past few years have brought wild fluctuations between flooding and drought, bringing more stress to the communities nestled along the Mississippi’s 2,350 miles.
In the last five years alone, they’ve seen springtime flooding, flash flooding, significant drought and low river levels, with opposite ends of this spectrum sometimes occurring in the same calendar year.
“When these rivers have disasters, the disaster doesn’t stay in the river,” said Colin Wellenkamp, executive director of the Mississippi River Cities and Towns Initiative. “It damages a lot of businesses, homes, sidewalks and streets; even broadband conduit and all kinds of utilities, mains and water return systems.”
The cost of those damages can run into the millions, if not billions.
One potential solution Wellenkamp encourages the 105 individual communities in his organization to consider is to work with, rather than against, the river.
“Just about all of them have some sort of inlet into the Mississippi River that they’re built around,” he said. “Some of them are big and some of them are really small. But all of them need attention.”
It’s not a new idea, and many cities are already investing in nature-based solutions, such as removing pavement, building marshes, and making room for the river to flow. Now, St. Louis is looking to learn from Missouri’s neighbors in Dubuque, Iowa, on what the city can do with its River Des Peres.
‘It’s just an eyesore’
“It’s just an eyesore,” said Beatrice Chatfield, 15, who was walking along the River Des Peres pedestrian and bike greenway with her mom Jen. “There’s trash and debris and muck in it. It’s just all-around gross.”
It’s less of a river and more of a large concrete and stone-lined drainage channel that winds from the Mississippi through the urban landscape before disappearing beneath St. Louis’ largest park, Forest Park. It then reemerges further west in the suburb of University City.
“It’s basically the small version of the LA River, which is just a cesspool,” said Sam Rein, 29. “During the summer it smells—we don’t exactly like living next to it, but it’s a neat feat of engineering that’s for sure.”
It can also be dangerous, Wellenkamp said.
“As the Mississippi River rises, the River Des Peres then begins to back up into people’s basements and yards and small businesses into the city,” he said.
Some 300 homes flooded in University City alone when the St. Louis region was hit with record breaking rainfall in July 2022. Wellenkamp argues St. Louis should look to other cities in the Mississippi River basin who’ve learned to work with water, instead of against it.
