Site selection criteria include good water quality and publicly-owned lands, Stoner said in a follow-up call. In Virginia, possible sites are Jones Point Park, an area just north of Belle Haven Park and Gravelly Point Park. She showed a slide identifying six possible sites for swimming beaches in the Washington region. The group’s website says that “the water is sometimes still too polluted for safe recreational use,” but asserts that some areas are “often clean enough to swim at public access points such as the Tidal Basin, Hains Point and Fletcher’s Cove.” They are advocating repeal of the District of Columbia’s swimming ban imposed in 1971. Showing a 1918 photo of swimmers on a three-tiered platform in Washington’s Tidal Basin, Stoner said that the network wants to make the river swimmable and to create public swimming beaches. The July 20, 2022, report found, for example, that the water at the marina "meets water quality standards," but water quality at Little Hunting Creek, “failed to meet water quality standards.” Their online Swim Guide reports results for E. Among other sites, the group collects samples at Oronoco Bay, Belle Haven Marina, Little Hunting Creek, Pohick Bay and National Harbor. coli bacteria weekly from May to September by taking samples and analyzing them in their floating lab, the Sea Dog. Today’s seeds will become tomorrow’s trees.”Īt 18 sites, Potomac Riverkeeper volunteers monitor turbidity, pH, temperature and E. This fall, the Conservancy will launch “Tomorrow’s Trees,” a program that will organize acorn and other hardwood seed collection that will then go to tree nurseries, providing what Belin called, “much needed stock. The Conservancy helped persuade the Maryland General Assembly to finance the planting of five million trees over the next 10 years and to require that at least 10 percent or half a million trees be planted in underserved communities. “Currently there is a real supply chain issue around having enough trees to plant,” Belin said, offering two solutions. Without riverside vegetation, silt, sediment, trash and other pollutants flow into rivers during rain storms. Trees, shrubs and other plants near waterways help filter out pollution, stabilize stream banks and keep streams and rivers cool in hot weather. “In fact, forested buffers, as we call them, received a flat-out F in our report card,” he cautioned. Nancy Stoner, President of the Potomac Riverkeeper Network (PRK) credited the 1972 federal Clean Water Act for much of the river’s improving health and commended Alexandria for being on schedule to meet the 2025 deadline for the $454.4 million River Renew project, an initiative designed to keep 140 million gallons of untreated sewage out of waterways each year.ĭespite some advances, “There is one glaring red mark,” Belin warned, streamside trees. The river’s water quality grade rose from a D in 2010 to a B- in 2020, reported Hedrick Belin, President of the Potomac Conservancy, adding, “There is still work to do.” While the Potomac River is no longer “a national disgrace,” as then-President Lyndon Johnson decried in 1965, it still faces challenges, two river stewards told a July 20 gathering of 40 at Alexandria’s Athenaeum.
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