City Subscriptions

City of Duluth and Partners Receive Prestigious Environmental Initiative Award

[Duluth, MN] - The City of Duluth’s Coffee Creek Daylighting and Restoration project was selected last night as an award recipient for the 2016 Minnesota Environmental Initiatives Award, Natural Resources category. The awards are given annually to projects that achieve extraordinary results and solve complex environmental issues through the power of partnerships. The organizers chose 6 award recipients; each representing one of six categories.


The award recognizes the City of Duluth, its partners, Barr Engineering and Minnesota Trout Unlimited, for their work to restore Coffee Creek, a small but highly valuable stream for native brook trout located within the Enger Golf Course. During the summer 2012 flood, the stream was devastated with damages to multiple infrastructure elements and a dam that fed into an irrigation pond.

“The project partners successfully created a more resilient stream that is less likely to sustain damage in the future,” said Chris Kleist with the City of Duluth. “The new stream channel provides valuable habitat for trout, is more resilient for future flood events, and promotes sustainable redevelopment of urban land.”

The City seized the opportunity to restore and daylight this highly impacted section of trout stream through the use of strategic partnerships to leverage funding sources and ensure the inclusion of habitat features within the restoration design. The City and its partners worked in collaboration with stakeholders such as the Minnesota Department of Natural Resources - Division of Ecological and Water Resources and Section of Fisheries (MN DNR) and the Minnesota Board of Water and Soil Resources (BWSR), to create a restoration plan. The project goals included the creation of a natural stream channel that would not only be more resilient to future flood events, but that would also provide valuable aquatic habitat for brook trout while also ensuring passage of aquatic organisms. Outcomes included over 1,200 feet of new stream channel, including high-quality trout habitat (40 in-stream structures and more than 200’ of toe wood), and over an acre of restored native vegetative buffer.

A video showcasing the work can be viewed at  https://youtu.be/1fv047Ywbp8

# # #

(Photo: from left to right, Al Kean (BWSR), Dave Weirens (BWSR), John Lenczewski (Executive Director MN Trout Unlimited), Chris Kleist (City of Duluth Public Works & Utilities), Jeff Lee (Sr Engineer, Barr Engineering), John Jaschke (Executive Director BWSR)