6.  Land Stewardship

The stewardship of the land and land-based resources and the regulation of uses and activities on land especially land near water bodies, wetlands, streams and rivers has a significant influence on the water quality and overall habitat quality of the Lackawanna watershed.  The history of resource exploitation, extractive use and land development in the Lackawanna watershed has created endemic problems, which continue to affect the river and its watershed.

This section reviews issues that have been identified in key person interviews, public meetings and in the stream walk surveys conducted by LRCA staff and volunteers as part of this plan.

6.1  Flood Plain Management

Due to the intensive development of many areas of Lackawanna River flood plain, property damage and loss from annual storms as well as major flood events has been a common occurrence.

As the communities developed along the floor of the Lackawanna Valley along with the anthracite industry, level buildable land was a premium.  There are numerous neighborhoods built on flood plain including: 

Successive floods in 1902, 1922, 1936, 1942, 1954 and 1955 were followed up by state and federal projects to dredge, berm, construct levees and flood walls and two flood control dams at Stillwater on the confluence of the east and west branches and on Aylesworth Creek.

The 1972 Hurricane Agnes flood, the flood of record (500-year flood) on the Susquehanna did not cause any appreciable flooding in the Lackawanna basin.  The Coxton area at the confluence was flooded and some individual properties or clusters of homes in Old Forge and Moosic were also flooded.  There was some bank instability along Springbrook Creek as well but by and large the Lackawanna Basin did not sustain the type of damage that the balance of the Susquehanna Basin received.

Hurricane Gloria in October 1985 and a winter rainstorm-snowmelt event in January 1996 caused street and basement flooding in Downtown Olyphant, and in The Plot, Green Ridge, and Albright –Weston Field neighborhoods in Scranton.  Bank failure and flooding of homes and trailers on Spring Brook and St. Johns Creek in Moosic and Old Forge were also recorded in the 1985 and 1996 events.

After the event crisis and the subsequent cleanup response, the 1985 and 1996 flood events generated a longer-term social, political and engineering response.

The 1985 event response generated congressional action authorizing the Corps of Engineers to study the flood problems and develop a solution.  The Albright Avenue Weston Field neighborhood levee in Scranton and the Olyphant levee were two alternatives deemed appropriate for continued federal involvement.  The Corps use of a one to one or greater cost benefit ratio indicated that the Green Ridge Flats and Plot neighborhoods did not qualify for a continued federal cost share.

The Albright and Olyphant levees are at last under construction with completion expected in 2003, eighteen years after the flood loss event.

The 1996 event occurring only eleven years after the 1985 event and flooding the same neighborhoods set off a maelstrom of political activity by The Plot Neighborhood Association and other neighborhood activists.  The criticism of the Corps economic analysis, which had previously considered The Plot, Greenridge and Albright levees as separate projects insured that firm congressional language in the water resources authorization would prevent a piecemeal economic analysis and lead toward a positive cost benefit ratio for the other areas in Scranton.  The project averaging cost benefit ratio has allowed a federal interest to be recognized in The Plot and Green Ridge neighborhoods.  Those levee projects are now proceeding to construction and will be built as a follow on implementation.

The 1996 event and the resulting levee projects in Olyphant and Scranton have been an issue of concern in Dickson City.  With new levees upstream and downstream of their community, many residents are worried that the next flood event will result in an over-topping of the Dickson City 60-year-old flood berm.  The Corps has since been authorized to study Dickson City to determine if federal interest in an improved level of flood protection is warranted there as well.

Since the flood events had occurred, an intensely emotional reaction developed in the affected neighborhoods.  This reaction and the concern of upland neighbors not to deny a decent level of protection to their fellow citizens downhill saw the public meetings completely dominated by a single issue constituency and all of the elected officials responding to that single issue with unanimity.  While this has helped to underscore the need for flood protection and has undoubtedly helped to get the levees built, the opportunities for rational discussion of all of the potential positive and negative impacts of the levees were notably absent from the process.

With a sense of concern about these issues and other factors, the Lackawanna River Corridor Association Board of Directors decided early on to support a levee project that would place the levee back from and allow the maintenance of the existing riparian corridor where feasible and would include provisions for the future use of the levees as part of the Lackawanna River Heritage Trail with opportunities for landscape and river access improvements.  LRCA involvement was focused on direct discussions with elected and appointed officials and staff of the Corps of Engineers.

The affordability of the local government share has been a limiting factor in the design and development of the levees that leaves a number of impacts to be addressed in the near future.  Due to affordability issues, the Corps recommended a mixture of acquisition by both fee and easement for levee construction and occupancy.  This means that although the government owns and maintains the levee, it rests on essentially private property wherever an easement was acquired in less than fee terms.  This leaves the private property owner with certain liabilities as well as the right to restrict or prevent public access and use.  These circumstances will require the extinguishments of the remaining fee interests if the levees are to be used as public trail and recreation corridors.

The other outcome of concern is that of several private property owners who will have the levee take a significant portion of their parcels without taking their homes.  The compensation, affordability issues and the hopscotch pattern of fee and easement taking are an unmet need that deserved more adequate consideration relative to the size of the indebtedness incurred by the local municipalities.

The flood plains and corridors of many tributary streams have also been affected by encroachments, relocated private property flood loss, post flood cleanups and follow-up flood control and channelization projects.  The following are major federally or state-funded flood channelization projects with the appropriate year and distance that the channelization work was installed:

Numerous other smaller creeks have been channelized and culvertized as a response to flood events, to facilitate local storm drainage work and for sewer projects.  Coal mining destroyed many watercourses or rerouted streams and the Lackawanna River itself.  As discussed in the mine reclamation plan, many streams were placed in flumes or other artificial channels by coal operations.  Most of these structures were not maintained after the closure of mining operations.  Subsequent storms and physical redevelopment of mine sites contributed to the failure of the flumes and artificial channels allowing the streams to return to their historic courses often choked with coal wastes, sediments and urban debris.

6.2  Stream Encroachment

The historical patterns of watershed and habitat destruction have contributed towards the prevalence of stream encroachments common in the Lackawanna watershed today.  The pattern of encroachments is incremental, many times occurring with a gradual filling of the flood plain and flood way fringe, in some instances into the watercourse itself.

Small property owners and developers soliciting the deposition of “clean fill” conduct most of these encroachments. The LRCA receives several reports of these activities on a monthly basis usually from a concerned neighbor or fisherman.  LRCA in turn sends staff to investigate and forward the complaint to municipal and state agencies.  Without adequate controls at the municipal level, state agencies do not always have jurisdiction especially outside the 100-year plain.

While actual encroachments into the watercourse and flood plain are numerous, the ability to control the numerous small private incidental encroachments is very limited.

6.3  Riparian and Upland Forest and Forestry Management

The Lackawanna River has a surprising extent of its riparian forest cover intact.  Based on the 1988 river and shoreline assessment and the 1999-2000 river and stream walk surveys, 88% of the Lackawanna riparian edge is intact or has recovered from previous damages.  40 of 320 one-quarter-mile-reaches exhibit a total loss of riparian cover.  These reaches are primarily flood control levees in Duryea, Scranton, Dickson City and Mayfield.  The second leading cause of riparian loss is property owner encroachments.  Culm dumps are the third riparian forest eliminator followed by clearances for bridge crossings.  Historic waterfront buildings in Carbondale, Archbald, Olyphant, Scranton and Old Forge also detract from the riparian corridor but add cultural interest and like bridge crossings, they comprise the least intrusive impacts.

The upland riparian forest and upland forest is a different story.  The LRCA survey did not measure forest cover.  Since the main stem of the Lackawanna Valley has been heavily urbanized and has had its topography and hydrogeology altered by coal mining, one would expect a significant loss of original forest cover.  The urbanized areas occupy approximately 20% of the surface feature of the valley, the adjacent abandoned mine land sites another 20%. (Spatial grid analysis by LRCA)   The urban community does however host an extensive urban forest.  The riparian corridor of the river and its tributary streams form key links joining the urban forest with the diverse upland forest along the Moosic and West Mountain ridges and in the headwaters areas above Carbondale and in the North Pocono watersheds.

The Lackawanna headwaters, the ridgeline forests and the North Pocono watershed forests are large fairly intact second to third generation growth successional forests.  The Moosic and West mountains also contain a globally rare dwarf tree forest of scrub oak and pitch pine in association with extensive heath barrens and rocky acidic outcrop communities.  There are three major property owners in the Lackawanna watershed forests.  The Pennsylvania Bureau of Forestry manages the nearly 10,000-acre Lackawanna State Forest along the boundary of the Lackawanna and Lehigh watersheds.  The Pennsylvania Game Commission manages 5,000 acres of game lands along Moosic Mountain in Archbald and several thousand acres in Ararat and Herrick townships in the headwaters area.  The Theta Corporation owns approximately thirty-thousand-acres in the Lackawanna watershed with large contiguous tracts in the Spring Brook and Roaring Brook watersheds, along the Moosic Mountain from Avoca to Carbondale and around several key headwaters sources such as Dunn Pond and Mud Pond in Ararat Township, Susquehanna County.

The Theta properties now privately owned were once part of the holdings of the former Pennsylvania Gas and Water Company (PG&W Co.)  PG&W’s parent Pennsylvania Enterprises Incorporated (PEI) sold its water business, 36 reservoirs and eight-thousand-acres of buffer lands to the Pennsylvania American Water Company (PAWC) in 1996.  LRCA was involved as a protestant during the Public Utility Commission hearings that eventually allowed the divestiture to proceed.  LRCA signed a consent decree with PG&W, which promised to develop a land use plan for its retained watershed lands.  LRCA staff participated in an advisory committee that worked with the Company in 1997–98 to develop a land use plan.  By the time the plan was completed, PEI changed the name of PG&W to PG Energy.

PEI and its PG Energy affiliate merged into the Southern Union Company of Austin, Texas in late 1999.  In February 2000, Southern Union sold the assets of Theta Company which included its 45,000 acres of watershed land in Lackawanna and Luzerne counties to an unnamed buyer for $12.3-million.  PG Energy had formerly sold a forestry harvest easement to Keystone Sanitary Landfill (KSL) in Dunmore in exchange for a 15-year supply of landfill gas for a steam electric generating plant in Archbald.

Theta and Keystone are presently conducting timber harvest on many tracts in the Lackawanna watershed.  The Pennsylvania Game Commission and Theta Company announced a game and hunting management program in August 2001 to allow hunting on 30 of the 45-thousand-acres of Theta lands.  There are also ongoing discussions between Theta and several conservation organizations for the potential acquisition and permanent conservation management of these forest lands.

There is a concern that the timber harvest on Theta lands is not a sustainable forest management harvest.  There have been opinions by forestry experts on both sides of this issue.  LRCA reviews have indicated that the harvest is similar to many others throughout the northeast region.  While some cuts may be heavier and are seemingly high yield cuts.  LRCA remains concerned about invasive species intrusions and the ultimate disposition of the Theta properties.

Another significant forest and habitat conservation project is underway with the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania, the Scranton Lackawanna Industrial Building Company - SLIBCO, Moosic Lakes Incorporated and The Nature Conservancy.  This project is expected to facilitate the acquisition of 2,400 acres of upland forest and ridge top barren by The Nature Conservancy.  This project will help to solve a multi year controversy that resulted when SLIBCO proposed the development of an industrial park on the ridge top of Moosic Mountain at the same time the site was recognized as the most important natural area in Lackawanna County.

6.4  Wetlands

The Lackawanna watershed contains over 20,000-acres of wetlands.  Another 10 to 15 thousand-acres of wetlands have been lost to mining activities and urban development (LRCA:  comparative analysis of historic topographic maps to contemporary maps).  The loss of wetlands and the ecological and hydrologic health of remaining wetlands is a major concern for water supply, storm water and flood management, wildlife habitat and overall watershed resource conservation.

Wetlands exist primarily in the forested watershed areas at the headwaters and along stream corridors of the upper Lackawanna River and tributary stream headwaters.  Known as Palustrine Forested Wetlands, they occur primarily on glacial terraces along the Moosic and West mountains, on the North Pocono Plateau and the Allegheny Plateau at the Lackawanna headwaters in Susquehanna and Wayne counties.

Some of the more significant and regionally important wetland complexes are:

·       Freytown and Hollister swamps at the headwaters of Roaring Brook

·       Bear Swamp, Simerson Marsh and Little Virginia along Stafford Meadow Brook

·       Yostville marshes, headwaters of Spring Brook and its tributaries

·       Dunns Pond, Orson Glade, Mud Pond complex on the East Branch of the Lackawanna

·       Lake Romobe, Ball Pond complex, West Branch headwaters of the Lackawanna

·       Panther Bluff tract

All of the Lackawanna’s smaller tributaries have their sources in wetlands on terraces along the Moosic and West mountains.  These perched wetlands serve as collectors for springs from ridge top aquifers which form in glacial sand and gravel deposits and in crevices along the conglomerate sandstone and shale outcrops on the ridgelines.  The conservation of open space and the maintenance of the ecological and hydrological integrity of springs and wetlands is crucial to the maintenance of good water quality and perennial flows in the Lackawanna watershed.

There are also a variety of riparian wetlands along the lower corridor of the river and its tributaries.  While mining and urban development had destroyed natural wetlands, the displaced water often flowed to adjacent areas and hydric soil conditions gradually created successional wetlands.  Strip mining has created many isolated pocket wetlands and some larger successional complexes.  This process has been aided by some mine reclamation work in recent years.

The confluence area at Duryea and Coxton holds some interesting water features.  Large areas of the confluence have been undermined and strip-mined for coal, and pit mined for sand and gravel.  The abandoned gravel pits at Coxton have since flooded with the interception of surface flows from Campbells Ledge run and Red Springs Run and the surface migration of mine water.  These ponds are known locally as the Duryea swamps.

The loss of wetlands occurs in the Lackawanna Valley as elsewhere on an incremental but relentless basis.  Much of the loss is on small private developments under five acres.  Many of the land clearing and grading operations on these small development sites are conducted without proper engineering or permitting.  This means that municipal, county, state and federal agencies often do not know about an impact until it is too late.  Again and again this pattern is repeated across the watershed.  Encroachments and fill of flood plains and stream corridors occur in a similar manner.

The expansion of sprawl related development into the mountains and former water supply watershed lands only accelerates the loss of wetlands and stream habitat.  There are several examples of wetlands losses occurring on larger developments. More effective local involvement in permitting and inspections would have precluded the fills and encroachments from occurring in the first place.

Some of these sites have had regulatory actions and mitigation has occurred or is planned.  For these major sites there are hundreds of “Mom and Pop”-encroachments which often escape notice for years.

6.5  Natural Areas and Open Space Management

The riparian corridors, upland watershed and ridge top forests and wetland complexes previously discussed provide the Lackawanna watershed with an extensive network of open space with a broad diversity of natural habitats.  This temperate forest ecosystem exists in close proximity to the extensive Scranton/Wilkes-Barre urban corridor and adjacent suburban villages.

Due to historical development patterns, the mountainous topography and extensive forested wetlands associated with water supply reservoir development in the late 19^th and early 20^th Century, the region benefited from a substantial, informal greenbelt system.  As the 20^th Century drew to a close, sprawl-type development has become an increasing threat to these open space and natural resources.  Sprawl is occurring as an out migration from the urban valley as well as from the New York/New Jersey metropolitan region to the east of the Pocono Plateau.  The proposed restoration of passenger rail service on the Scranton–New Jersey rail corridor may place additional pressures on the open space resources of the Lackawanna watershed particularly in the North Pocono sub-watersheds.

This is the basis of concern expressed by many local residents and public officials especially in the context of watershed land associated with the water supply system.  The land use plan developed in 1998 for the Theta Corporation watershed lands examined some of  the concerns and recommended that a majority of Theta tracts remain in long-term timber management and/or be conveyed through acquisition or easement to conservancies or public resource agencies such as the Bureau of Forestry, State Parks or Game Commission.  A decision of Theta in July 2001 previously referred to will develop a management program for hunting under the direction of the Game Commission.  Additional proposals for acquisition are in discussion between various private agencies and Theta with a potential for state involvement.

In this context, several Commonwealth agencies and a private foundation are funding a Lackawanna County open space management plan.  A similar and related plan is being conducted in Luzerne County.

The Nature Conservancy developed a natural areas inventory for Lackawanna County in 1997.  That inventory was developed with the support of the Lackawanna Heritage Valley Authority with a programmatic interest in facilitating open space and natural resource conservation and the Neighborhood Development Trust that is associated with the Scranton Chamber of Commerce.  An overlay of the inventory on the watershed tracts is included in the resource mapping of the PG Energy (Theta) land use plan.  Both of these documents can help to inform the decision making associated with the pending open space plan.

Additional issues that affect open space management and natural areas protection and which have been mentioned by study participants or identified in stream walk surveys or by inference in other public forums are as follows:

·       Concerns that sprawl development destroys or fragments open space and natural areas and causes ecosystem degradation.

·       Development and land clearing activities promote the  introduction of non-native, invasive, exotic and noxious species.

·       Fragmentation and adjacent development accelerate intrusive public use or misuse of natural resource areas resulting in further habitat destruction and degradation, i.e. littering, illegal dumping, trespass, ATV damages.

·        The proximity of development to natural areas increases the urban-wild lands interface with related public safety and fire control issues.

·       The creation of infrastructure, roads and buildings increases the areas of impervious surface accelerating storm hydrographs causing further downstream aquatic habitat degradation.

6.6  Land Use Regulations and Watershed Best Management Practices

Land use regulations, subdivision, development and zoning regulations governed by local municipalities are often the first line of defense in protecting water quality and natural resources.  There is a wide arc in the capacity of the numerous municipalities in the watershed with regard to the administration of adequate regulations.  Municipalities in the watershed range from the City of Scranton with 70,000 residents and a professional municipal staff to the Borough of Vandling with 650 residents and a part time staff.  There is a wide disparity in the quality of the various regulations and their ability to address a greater number of watershed variables.  There is an urgent need to upgrade both the quality of municipal ordinances and the to expand the diversity of environmental topics addressed by the municipalities.

Storm water loading, road construction, site grading and the variable of soil and rock conditions as well as building site suitability, slope issues, are just a few issues which are inadequately addressed at the municipal-watershed level.

Two factors underlie the need to implement thoughtful site and activity Best Management Practices in the watershed:  the increasing number of new homes and businesses being developed on abandoned mine land in the river corridor and the potential for suburban sprawl-type growth in the North Pocono watershed.

Growing Greener & Growing Smarter best development practices are a newer dimension to the process of contemporary community development in Pennsylvania.  These practices promote an understanding that traditional village and small main street town and country development can be more economically and environmentally sustainable than the automobile-based suburban sprawl that has been prevalent for the past sixty years.

The Center for Watershed Protection, a nonprofit education and technology organization based in Maryland has become a notable source for watershed best management practices.  The Natural Lands Trusts in Media, Pennsylvania has developed a conservation development practices guide based on the work of Randall Arendt and other practitioners of traditional development practices, which suggest ways that the design of the built environment can be accomplished in greater harmony with its natural environment.  Staff from both of these and similar organizations, as well as an increasing number of consultants and engineers in private practice, have been active in working with municipal groups across Pennsylvania and neighboring states.  Audits of existing ordinances can become a starting point to upgrade the capacity of local municipalities as agencies for sustainable watershed protections. 

The use of land trusts or conservancies in partnership with property owners, developers and municipalities can bring new tools and resources to address needs for open space, natural areas management and watershed best management practices.  Conservancies can work with property owners and developers to design and implement open space resource conservation plans.  The Lackawanna Valley Conservancy was incorporated in 1995 and works in affiliation with the LRCA to provide conservation planning, acquisition, management and education services throughout the Lackawanna watershed.

6.7  Reclamation and Economic Development

The reclamation of nearly 50,000 acres of abandoned mine lands in the Lackawanna Valley, the subsequent reuse of those lands and other economic and community development on mine lands and adjacent sites can be seen in two ways:  as an opportunity to help restore watershed habitat and water quality values or as a source of future problems from unwise, haphazard and incremental developments.

The recent change in regional economic development strategy has brought a focus to redevelopment of abandoned mine lands for all types of projects.  Industrial and business parks, shopping malls, residential and mixed-use developments have been developed on AML sites in the past and they have been successful.  Keystone and Stauffer business parks, Viewmont and Commerce malls, North Point Estates in Olyphant, the Woodlands in Jermyn are historical and contemporary examples of economically successful projects with varying degrees of environmental sustainability.  Newer projects designed and built specifically to respond to reclamation needs, with sustainable design goals can help to restore the degraded habitats of the Lackawanna watershed.  These infill-type projects can offer an alternative to suburban sprawl into the water supply areas.

Conservation designs for suburban subdivisions which incorporate multiuse mixed-zoning and residential zoning in higher densities integrated into the sites topography and habitat can provide opportunities for economic and community growth at the same time limiting negative impacts to the sites environment, watershed and ecological habitat.  The creation of neo-traditional village developments can meet all of our economic and residential needs while conserving land and water resources.  Conservation designs essentially accomplish all of the economic goals for a subdivision development while creatively conserving 40% to 70% of the site by designing the developed portion on the remaining 30% to 60%.  These practices can exempt steep slopes, wetlands, flood plains from the development footprint and qualify to support higher densities on the developed area of a site.

The dissemination of these practices and their incorporation into local ordinances and their adoption by the development and building sector is recognized as an important watershed protection goal by a large number of participants in this river conservation planning work.  Numerous individuals, agency staff, municipal officials and business interests have recognized the problems associated with incremental and sprawl-related development.  Comments at public meetings and key person discussions indicate a significant level of interest in upgrading municipal development practices in the Lackawanna watershed.

6.8  Litter, Illegal Dumping and Contaminated Sites

Littering, dumping and contamination from toxic or hazardous materials are problematic across the Lackawanna watershed.  Contaminated sites range from the Marjol Battery site in Throop to a myriad of electric power pole sites under Pennsylvania Act 2 remediation.

Several sites have been cleaned up under the federal superfund program:  The Iaccavazi Dump in Old Forge, The Lehigh Electric site along the Lackawanna River in Old Forge, The Aladdin Plating site near Leggetts Creek in South Abington and the Lavelle Bore Hole in Scranton.  Of these sites, the Lavelle Bore Hole and Lehigh Electric directly contributed to contamination in the river, which has since been abated.

There are a range of small sites that have been listed on the Federal CERCLES and RCRA lists, state list for underground and leaking underground storage tanks (UST’s and LUST’s).  Contamination at most reported sites has been limited or abated.

Due to the nature of the abandoned mine lands, there are a multitude of sites along the river and in upland areas of the watershed that are used as automotive junkyards, scrap metal yards and in several conspicuous cases, municipal waste landfills.  Other abandoned mine lands serve to degrade the habitat and aesthetics of the watershed and adjacent developments.  Many of these properties are the site of illegal dumping of household waste, construction and demolition debris, furniture and appliances (white goods). 

There area a variety of levels of municipal waste collection services for the effective control of furniture and white goods.  There are no trash drop-off centers (other than the landfills or a private waste collection site) to regularly receive household wastes, furniture, and construction waste.  There are adequate municipal waste collection services for garbage.  Lackawanna County operates a superb recycling center and program for newspaper, office paper, corrugated cardboard, plastic bottles, glass bottles, jars and metal cans.

Due to the presence of the Alliance Landfill in Taylor and the Keystone Landfill in Dunmore, the Lackawanna watershed is one of the largest out-of-state trash import and burial sites in Pennsylvania.  An average of 8,000 tons of waste per day is landfilled at these two landfills.  Only about 5% of this waste is generated in the watershed.

Littering and dumping also occurs at remote and pristine sites in the forests and ridge tops of the watershed, again construction debris, auto parts, tires, white goods, furniture, and household waste are to be found along utility roads, jeep trails and abandoned rail grades.  Trash fires at these sites are occasionally the source of forest fires and mine fires.

The most recently developed anti-litter and dumping campaign for state forest and parks may provide a model for use in the Lackawanna watershed over the hundreds of thousands of acres of privately owned forest lands and open space.

A litter and dumping enforcement program has been suggested as well to involve community groups, local police, magistrates and the district attorney’s office.