FLOOD00850

• Designation Number: 31
• County: Arapahoe
• Community: Unincorporated Arapahoe County
• Title: Major Drainageway Planning - Little Dry Creek, Report, Volume I
• Date: 2/1/1974
• Designation Date: 6/1/1974
• Floodplain - Doc Type: Floodplain Report/Masterplan

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Cook Creek in Douglas County. Cook Creek has characteristics similar to

those of the adjacent Willow Creek except that the channel of Cook Creek is

more open and there are even fewer willows.

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Greenwood Gulch in Cherry Hills. As previously noted, the embankment of

Clarkson Street has blocked any flow in Greenwood Gulch from passing into

Englewood. Immediately east of the intersection of Clarkson Street and

Jefferson Avenue flood water ponds and disappears only by infiltration in-

to the ground and evaporation. The only existing channel to carry the

4,400 cfs flood peak expected from a lOO-year storm is the totally inade-

quate City Ditch located roughly l,OOO feet east of Clarkson Street. Such

a peak flow will inundate the entire vicinity in a large lake, part will

flow over Clarkson Street embankment, and part will flow in a shallow wide

band southward to join the Little Dry Creek waterway. Channelization of

Greenwood Gulch to Little Dry Creek at this location is urgently needed to

reduce flood damages.

Between City Ditch and Cherry Hills Country Club golf course a 400-foot

reach clogged with cattails and weeds adds undesirable flow resistance.

A 6-foot woven wire fence crosses the channel at the golf course.

The channel through the golf course is smooth and with the close trimming

of grass to the waters edge, the mile-long reach offers minimal resistance

to flow. There are only two bridges in the reach, but like those over ad-

jacent Little Dry Creek, the light structures are subject to being carried

downstream during a flood. Culverts of 24-inch to 30-inch diameter exist

singly or in groups at five locations. The small capacity of these cul-

verts suit them only for dry weather flows, but for 10, 25 or 100-year

runoff they are totally inadequate. There is a 1.6-acre pond on Greenwood

Gulch at the southeast of the golf course with about l.5 feet of freeboard.

The dike that forms the pond is about 8 feet high. A smaller pond with a

lower dike exists at the northwest of the golf course on Greenwood Gulch.

These dikes and the adjacent golf course would be overtopped and inundated

in a lOO-year flood event.

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