Red Cedar Floods

From Great Lakes Wiki

By Claire Cummings

Running the bases wasn’t necessary for Michigan State baseball players in 1947. They floated to home instead.

“They couldn’t play baseball there so they were playing in the canoes,” recalled Jack Thompson, a longtime East Lansing resident. “They were just fooling around.”

As water poured over the banks of the Red Cedar River that year, it crept close to MSU dormitories and transformed the nearby Sears parking lot into a lake.

“I remember walking down the railroad tracks which are built up,” Thompson said. “It was above the flood but on each side of it, it was flooded.”

It’s flooding like that – and again in 1975 – that points to the environmental headaches created when builders and others ignore the Red Cedar River’s floodplain.

The rebuilding of New Orleans has brought national attention to such construction. Critics think it absurd to rebuild a city where flooding is a perpetual threat. But you don’t need to go to New Orleans to find construction conflicting with floodplains.

Contents 1 Building in floodplains 2 Proposed floodplain development 3 Wetlands more than just a place for water 4 Plants and animals displaced 5 Permits overwhelmingly approved 6 Ecosystems threatened 7 Building without a map 8 Related Links

Building in floodplains

“No time, no place - ever - have I heard a good reason to build in the floodplain,” said Pat Lindemann, the Ingham County drain commissioner.

“It’s just a stupid thing to do, and why we as a government even have a policy to build down there is just stupid.”

For buyers and developers, waterfront property spells big bucks. But it also translates into water damage, increased building costs and high insurance premiums. And it’s disastrous for plants and animals that rely on periodic flooding, and can even impair water quality when rain flushes into the river dirt and other contaminants from roofs, streets and parking lots.

Government permits to build in floodplains usually specify building height and easements, but not wildlife protection. Naturalists say that the permitting process is too easy and can have long-lasting effects on the environment.

It isn’t something people always thought about. When developers put up buildings near the Red Cedar River in the ’50s and ‘60s, they didn’t really have the floodplain in mind, said Jim van Ravensway, East Lansing’s planning and community development director. Government didn’t begin regulating construction in floodplains until the 1970s.

“Nobody would allow the asphalt parking lots to be built right against the river (today),” he said.

The low-lying floodplains give water a place to percolate through the soil, said Kit Rich, senior park naturalist for the Harris Nature Center in Okemos. As it seeps back into the river, the standing water is cleansed by the soil, nurtures plants and gives amphibians a place to lay eggs.

But this cycle is often interrupted by development, especially if areas are paved over.

Proposed floodplain development

The view from canoe of the north side of the Red Cedar between Okemos Road and Bogue Street on MSU’s campus is of apartment parking lots bumped up to a slope that pours runoff into the river. Few sections are accessible to the public.

East Lansing officials plan to overhaul a 35-acre section north of the river. The project would replace rental units with owner-occupied and rental housing above ground-level stores.

A planned $7.8-million boat basin will create more developable land in the floodplain, give the water a place to go and provide the area with some character, said Lori Mullins, a senior project manager for the city.

Michigan’s Department of Environmental Quality – the DEQ - has approved the project.

Wetlands more than just a place for water

One goal of the boat basin is to improve the river quality and its habitat by creating more open space on the riverfront, but it is not designed as a habitat, Mullins said.

Critics say it will be difficult to reproduce natural conditions.

”It’s a good idea from the engineering standpoint,” Rich said. “But from an environmental standpoint, a wetland is more than a place where the water goes.”

Certain soil types and water content are what give floodplains and wetlands their own character.

“There’s such an intricate balance there and once you destroy that, it’s off kilter and hard to ever return,” said Jeremy Emmi, executive director of the Michigan Nature Association.

Plants and animals displaced

A basin next to the Red Cedar would probably remain dry most of the time because the water level isn’t high enough, Rich said. Plant and animal communities would be bumped out.

“It’s basically just a dead area,” she said. “From people’s point of view, it’s like, ‘Well we aren’t getting flooding, so we’re happy.’ But there’s always more to it than what’s on the surface."

East Lansing officials plan to revamp the area during the next 10 to 15 years. But building or redeveloping in a floodplain can be costly and time-consuming.

MSU officials called off plans in February 2005 to build a new dorm near the Brody Complex because its location in the floodplain would raise the cost almost $4 million, and lower the number of students who could live there.

There are building codes a structure must comply with to be legally constructed in a floodplain, including a certain elevation above the ground or distance from the river, said Les Thomas, National Floodplain Insurance Program coordinator for the state of Michigan.

Property owners are required to buy extra insurance and adhere to specific building standards. Still, some people like Emmi say getting a permit is too easy.

Permits overwhelmingly approved

Fifty-four out of 67 applications for floodplain permits along the Red Cedar River between 2000 and 2005 were approved, according to the DEQ.

The state issues construction permits all the time, Thomas said, but builders must meet standards to prevent harm to the buildings and people at risk in the flood’s path.

“We gotta let mother nature’s water go where it should be going,” he said.

Building damage and loss of life are the same concerns with floodplains today as they have always been.

“Anybody that wants to place a structure in a floodplain is putting themselves in harms way,” Thomas said.

Still, that doesn’t stop them from doing it.

People build their “starter castles” on the cheap property because they think it will get them better property values, Lindemann said. But the lines on the flood maps show the chances are great that water will one day consume their homes.

“Let’s see them watch Monday Night Football in their living room, drinking a beer watching the TV floating around,” he said.

Ecosystems threatened

And, of course, rare ecosystems are also at risk.

Places like Williamston have few open spaces left along the Red Cedar, but that isn’t stopping the Michigan Nature Association from trying to protect the remaining wildlife. The association hopes to acquire a 10-acre portion of the floodplain and work with a private developer to bump back some of the planned lots to preserve the riverfront.

Unlike other areas on the river, the land still has its natural character, including native plants like skunk cabbage and marsh marigold, Emmi said. Williamston is one of 10 locations – mostly floodplain forests - where the association is acquiring and protecting land.

Those who oppose floodplain construction see much of the problem rooted in attitudes toward regulating private property.

More riverside municipalities have adopted floodplain and wetland protection ordinances in the past 20 years, which tighten the federal and state laws that already exist, Rich said.

But ignorance still rules among those who live there, “not because people are stupid, but because they just haven’t gotten the information,” she said.

Riverfront houses in Okemos near the Harris Nature Center - built between the 1950s and 1970s - pose an inconspicuous threat, Rich said.

People aren’t dumping trash into the river, but the weed killers and fertilizers they use on yards in the floodplain get washed into it.

Many people aren’t even aware they are in areas that may flood anywhere from every 10 to every 500 years.

Building without a map

Part of the problem is education; another is outdated maps.

Livingston and Ingham county officials say maps of the Red Cedar’s floodplains are quickly outdated by continuous development.

“It’s hard for me to take you to a particular piece of ground and know exactly where the floodplain boundary is,” said Ken Recker, chief deputy drain commissioner for Livingston County.

Development pressure near Fowlerville in Livingston County and along the Interstate-96 corridor has forced officials there to take a second look at maps. Currently, the only area mapped in the county is Fowlerville after the flood of 1975 caused tremendous damage and pushed community members to alert those who would be in harms way during the next flood.

It’s important to find floodplain boundaries because new development could send extra water downstream to basements in Okemos and East Lansing, Recker said. But it shouldn’t take a devastating event for people to realize that impact.

And when thousands of people fail to understand their surroundings, it decreases the capacity of the floodplain to clean the water running through the land that the Red Cedar drains, Emmi said.

“Everyone thinks they have the right, and I guess sometimes they do, to fill in their little piece of heaven.”

Related Links

Red Cedar River (Michigan)
Red Cedar Storm
Red Cedar Wetlands
Red_Cedar_Sewers
Red Cedar Farm
Red Cedar Groundwater
Red Cedar Pharmaceuticals