Project Links
Debris Removal from Little Pine Island - Pine Island Bayou Corridor Unit
Big Thicket National Preserve » Debris Removal from Little Pine Island - Pine Island Bayou Corridor Unit » Document List
Regional Director Mike Snyder today signed a Finding of No Significant Impact (FONSI) to remove some large woody debris and foreign, human-caused debris from the Little Pine Island Bayou located within Big Thicket National Preserve, a step which concludes the agency's environmental review of the project and allows the project to go forward.
The project is designed to help reduce the risk of out-of-bank water flows that might be enhanced by the presence of trees and other large debris deposited in the bayou after Hurricane Rita. In April, the agency completed an Environmental Assessment of the debris-clearing project which, the National Park Service has determined, will not have a significant impact on the Preserve and therefore will not require further environmental study.
This one-time removal is targeted to accumulations of debris that have the potential to block the waterway, which in turn could heighten the risk of flooding of nearby areas. As such, this action is targeted to larger obstructions, such as downed trees that span the bayou from bank to bank, and select pieces of larger debris that may snag more material and significantly obstruct the waterway. The park service decided against clearing out smaller accumulations of debris that agency hydrologists determined do not contribute to significant flow obstructions or cause atypical flooding.
For more information about this decision, we encourage you to read the FONSI as well as the press release (see document list on the left). For a hard copy of either, please contact Chris Peapenburg.
Sincerely,
Todd W. Brindle
Superintendent
Contact Information
Chris PeapenburgBig Thicket National Preserve
6044 FM 420
Kountze, Texas 77625
Tel 409-951-6802