Passaic River Restoration Initiative: A New Model for Cleaning Up

Many urban rivers nationwide contain severely contaminated sediments that affect aquatic life and limit recreational and economic uses. At current rates of removal, it would take between 100 and 400 years to remove the problem by dredging, even if all discharges to surface water bodies in the U.S. were to be terminated immediately. In response to this situation, a new cooperative program to restore rivers affected by contaminated sediments is being undertaken in the Passaic River Basin, New Jersey. The approach involves an urban industrial river restoration project by the Corps of Engineers, working in conjunction with the Environmental Protection Agency and other appropriate federal, state and local agencies, through the standard civil works project development process. Under this urban river restoration approach, the Corps is conducting a cooperative project planning and development processes to identify and apply the most feasible technical solutions to achieve environmental restoration and economic revitalization in the Lower Passaic River Basin. With its long history of contamination, large number of dischargers, complex mix of contaminants, and problems with on-going pollution, the lower Passaic River in New Jersey is viewed as an excellent test of this new paradigm