Friday, March 25, 2011

Where we started

So this is the monitored location.  This map shows Route 1 and Neabsco Rd in Woodbridge Virginia.  The building on the left is a Wawa gas station, which was essentially built on a manufactured penninsula on the creek flood plain.  Our housing development was also built on fill to elevate it above the flood plain.  About a mile to the east is the Potomac River. 
All of this land used to be part of the Lee Family (as in Cival War General Robert E. Lee) Plantation.  Leesylvania State Park is about a mile downstream, too.  The bulk of the land in this photo around the creek is now owned by Prince William County Park Authority and developer Robert B. Hart.


VDOT Picture Taken in 2007

Until 2009, this portion of Neabsco Creek had a nasty habit of flooding Route 1 (a major Northern Virginia Road) because of the huge amount of debris that collected under the old bridge.  So, the Virginia DOT solved that problem by building a higher bridge so all of the debris would not get stuck any longer. 
This, of course, did not even remotely solve the problem, it just pushed all of the trash into the creek wetlands and the Potomac River.  Solves VDOT's problem, but since my drinking water comes from the Potomac--like most of Northern Virginia--I am not as fond of this solution as they were.



My picture taken during rain storm in Fall 2010--after new bridge completed

One of dozens of tires in the creek--along with an oil sheen
What is difficult to see in the above satellite photo is that only a few yards west of Route 1, bordering the creek is a complex of auto repair shops.  Now, we all need auto repair businesses (I have to go to work, too), but I am pretty sure I pay a disposal fee each time I need new tires so the company can properly dispose of them.  Paying them to throw tires into the creek does not really qualify as "Properly dispose" in my book.  Yet there are dozens of tires within 4 blocks of those shops.  Not a coincidence.

In addition to the Wawa shown in the picture, there are 4 more gas stations within 2 blocks of the creek at this point--7-11, Shell and a PW Police Vehicle gas station.  ALL of the runoff flows directly to the creek.  Add the auto repair oil changes and absolutely nothing in place to clean up accidental spills and we get a glossy sheen on the water. 
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2 comments:

  1. AnonymousJune 24, 2013 at 9:20 PM

    Hi. Growing up and playing in that creek thirty years ago, I found plenty of tires in that creek - plenty far upstream from that Wawa on Rt 1. And this is way back when you could fish and hunt crawfish/crawdads in it. It's not the damn auto repair businesses.

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  2. AnonymousJune 24, 2013 at 9:39 PM

    And to clarify, you could fish fish, and catch crawfish, my hippy brothers and sisters took me camping and we had a boil from what they caught from the creek.

    I agree, Neabsco is polluted anymore. But if you look up stream, IIRC it runs through Mananas then through Dale City. I know every sewer in Dale City empties into that stream. As the community expanded, the worse the creek became.

    Fun fact: you used to be able to find arrow heads/Indian stuff, old school farming settlement artifacts (my brother used to find their thrash heaps and would sell antique bottles before ebay/internet), and cannon balls & other Civil War items.

    That whole Neabsco creek valley was Indian Land. Then a farming community sprung along it. And at some point, Civil troops rolled down through it.

    Like I said, I've fished fish and gathered crawfish. My brother used to hunt a herd of deer that roamed from behind Kmart in Dale City/95 up to Mananas. So there was an ecosystem. And I saw it deteriorate.

    We agree. But it's not the tire repair businesses at fault.

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