River Reintroduction into Maurepas Swamp Project (PO-0029) Preliminary Operations, Maintenance, Monitoring, and Adaptive Management Plan Authors: Honora Buras Thomas McLain Brad Miller Danielle Richardi Carol Parsons Richards River Reintroduction into Maurepas Swamp Project (PO-0029) Preliminary Operations, Maintenance, Monitoring, and Adaptive Management Plan TABLE OF CONTENTS List Of Figures ................................................................................................................................ 2 List Of Tables ................................................................................................................................. 2 List Of Abbreviations ..................................................................................................................... 2 Introduction ..................................................................................................................................... 5 Project Goals And Objectives ......................................................................................................... 9 Project Constraints And Uncertainties .......................................................................................... 10 Project History .............................................................................................................................. 11 Project Numerical Modeling ......................................................................................................... 12 Project Description........................................................................................................................ 13 Operations ..................................................................................................................................... 15 Maintenance .................................................................................................................................. 20 Monitoring .................................................................................................................................... 20 Monitoring For Structural Integrity And Function ....................................................................... 21 Monitoring For Ecosystem Response ........................................................................................... 22 Adaptive Management .................................................................................................................. 28 References Cited ........................................................................................................................... 30 Appendix A: Operations, Monitoring, And Maintenance Of Project Features ............................ 31 Appendix B: Prior Studies And Reports ....................................................................................... 40 1 LIST OF FIGURES 1. Map depicting project influence area and conveyance channel. ....................................... 4 2. Main project features ........................................................................................................ 10 3. Maurepas project features and WSLP project features ..................................................... 14 4. Expected number of days the Mississippi River will meet or exceed a given river stage at the USACE Reserve gage (01260) ....................................................................... 15 LIST OF TABLES 1. Required Mississippi River stage at USACE Reserve gage (01260) and the expected number of days the river will meet or exceed that stage in an average year to attain different diversion flow conditions ............................................................. 16 2. Proposed monitoring elements and timeline for the project. ............................................ 22 LIST OF ABBREVIATIONS 1D One-dimensional 2D Two-dimensional ADCIRC Advanced Circulation Model ADCP Acoustic Doppler current profiler AREMA American Railway Engineering and Maintenance-of-Way Association C Carbon CEMVN United States Army Corps of Engineers, New Orleans District cfs Cubic feet per second chl a Chlorophyll a CIMS Coastal Information Management System CIR Color infrared CN RR Canadian National Railroad CPRA Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority CRMS Coast-wide Reference Monitoring System CWPPRA Coastal Wetlands Planning, Protection, and Restoration Act DBH Diameter at breast height DO Dissolved oxygen EPA United States Environmental Protection Agency 2 GEBF Gulf Environmental Benefit Fund HEC-RAS Hydrologic Engineering Center-River Analysis System I-10 Interstate 10 KCS RR Kansas City Southern Railroad LA 44 River Road LDNR Louisiana Department of Natural Resources LDOTD Louisiana Department of Transportation and Development LDEQ Louisiana Department of Environmental Quality LDWF Louisiana Department of Wildlife and Fisheries MRGO Mississippi River Gulf Outlet NFWF National Fish and Wildlife Foundation + NH4 Ammonium - NO3 Nitrate OCM Louisiana Department of Natural Resources, Office of Coastal Management OMMAM Operations, Maintenance, Monitoring, and Adaptive Management PM Performance measure -3 PO4 Phosphate RESTORE Act Resources and Ecosystems Sustainability, Tourist Opportunities, and Revived Economies of the Gulf Coast States Act RSET Rod surface elevation table SCADA Supervisory control and data acquisition SiO4 - Silicate SLR Sea level rise SWAMP System-wide Assessment and Monitoring Program SWMM Stormwater Management Model TAG Technical Advisory Group TN Total nitrogen TP Total phosphorous TSS Total suspended solids US 61 Airline Highway USACE United States Army Corps of Engineers USFWS United States Fish and Wildlife Service USGS United States Geological Survey WMA Wildlife Management Area WSLP West Shore Lake Pontchartrain Project 3 Suggested Citation: Buras, H.S., McLain, T., Miller, B., Richardi, D., Richards, A.C.P. 2018. River Reintroduction into Maurepas Swamp Project (PO-0029) Preliminary Operations, Maintenance, Monitoring, and Adaptive Management Plan. Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority. Baton Rouge, LA. 30 pp. plus appendices. 4 INTRODUCTION This preliminary Operations, Maintenance, Monitoring, and Adaptive Management (OMMAM) plan was written by the Coastal Protection and Restoration Authority (CPRA) of Louisiana staff in the Executive, Planning and Research, Engineering, Operations, and Project Management divisions to inform the implementation and adaptive management of the Mississippi River Reintroduction into Maurepas Swamp (PO-0029) Project. This project will introduce Mississippi River water into the southern portion of the Maurepas Swamp via a gated intake structure at the river levee and a conveyance channel into the project area, with additional outfall features designed to help distribute the flow throughout the project area to reduce or minimize future loss of coastal forest habitat. CPRA engineers and ecologists provided input to the plan and utilized the extensive body of work (see Appendix B) that has been conducted over the last couple of decades during project development. In addition, we relied on the existing framework of the System-wide Assessment and Monitoring Program (SWAMP) and its wetland component, the Coast-wide Reference Monitoring System (CRMS). CPRA’s established standard operating procedures and protocols for the protection and restoration program have informed this OMMAM plan as well. The goal of this preliminary plan is to describe key features of the project along with management of their operations, maintenance, and monitoring. Additionally we contracted a Technical Advisory Group (TAG) of forest ecologists to provide general operational plan guidance for project success and identify key monitoring elements to assess success of the project as it relates to its goals and objectives (Krauss et al. 2017). A more detailed operational plan will be developed based on information obtained from the new Delft 3D model outputs and input from the TAG, among other sources. The CPRA has long recognized the importance of adaptive management as it relates to Louisiana’s coastal program. Because both natural and socio-economic systems are inherently uncertain, it is difficult to predict future effects of restoration actions with complete certainty. As both the coastal landscape and CPRA have changed over the years, CPRA has spent an increasing amount of time on adaptive management efforts. Adaptive management, as CPRA defines it, is a structured process for making decisions over time through active learning that enables adjustments to be made in projects and programs as new information becomes available (Raynie 2017). It embraces a scientific approach that involves identifying goals and objectives, developing and implementing actions, assessing the system’s response to the actions, and utilizing that knowledge to make management decisions. It also recognizes the importance of stakeholder engagement and consensus building when implementing actions that affect structural, ecological, and socio-economic systems. Adaptive management is especially critical with this project because it is CPRA’s first Mississippi River reintroduction into a swamp ecosystem and as such, does not have a well-established boiler plate or text book template to 5 follow. An adaptive management approach helps identify realistic outcomes that can be expected from project implementation. In addition to CPRA’s recognition of the importance of adaptive management, other programs operating in Louisiana’s coast are including adaptive