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<br />WATERSHED MANAGEMENT AND URBAIl WUER AND <br />ENVIRONMEHTAL INFRASTRUC~ SYSTEMS <br /> <br /> ~ <br />, f. <br />~ <br />I .. <br /> <br />1.0 Introduction <br /> <br />urban water and environmental infrastructure systems (UWEISs) for water <br />supply, wastewater, and stormwater management are vital to maintaining our <br />future leading role in the world (Stakhiv et al. 1987). The United States is <br />faced with the prospect of major expenditures for infrastructure while at the <br />same time trying to resolve major problems with a large federal deficit. <br />Much of this UWEIS is beginning to crumble due to neglect and lack of mainte- <br />nance as well as because of obsolescence (National Science Foundation 1993). <br />Existing UWEISs were typically planned as part of a public sector watershed <br />development whose objective was to tame our natural systems for the better- <br />ment of mankind. While this infrastructure has provided many significant <br />benefits, it has also left a legacy of destruction of our natural systems <br />including wetlands, canyons, cultural displacement, and pollution of our <br />surface and ground waters. During the past twenty years, a new environmental <br />ethic has emerged that questions.the basic assumptions of much the develop- <br />ment of UWEISs. We now see very strong public opposition to virtually all of <br />our supply augmentation methods, sag_, dams, pipelines, levees, and an in- <br />sistence that we greatly improve our management of the demand for these <br />services such as water supply and flood control. The 1993 Great Flood on the <br />Mississippi River has prompted the creation of a Presidential Commission to <br />reevaluate the wisdom of conventional flood control policies (Floodplain <br />Management Review Committee 1994). The desirability of large dams and levee <br />systems is being questioned, and non-structural options like restoration of <br />wetlands are being given serious consideration. We even see initiatives to <br />eliminate existing infrastructure to recreate the original river, e.g., the <br />Kissimmee River in Florida. <br />Future UWEISs will emphasize real-time control of smart systems, demand <br />management, multi-purpose design and operation, explicit treatment of risk, <br />and use of sophisticated computer-based management systems. This proposal <br />outlines a methodology for demonstrating that an integrated systems approach <br />to the problem can significantly improve our ability to manage urban infra- <br />structure as a subsystem of a watershed management program. The literature <br />review demonstrates that such concepts have been espoused before but were <br />never successfully demonstrated for urban areas. Part of the reason was the <br />lack of computing resources that is no longer a problem. A key element of <br />this proposal is to demonstrate the proof of concept using the Boulder Creek <br />Watershed (Bew) and the City of Boulder as the case study. The next section <br />presents a literature review on this subject. Then, the BCW is described and <br />the proposed research program is outlined. <br /> <br />2.0 Literature Review <br /> <br />2.1 Watershed as a Unifying ~heme <br /> <br />2.1.1 Overview <br />The concept of integrated water and land management was first articulat- <br />ed in the western United States by John Wesley Powell in a report to the <br />Congress in 1878 (Peterson, 1984). During the 20th century, interest in <br />watershed planning has come and gone several times. Heaney (1993) suggests <br />that the current wave of interest in watershed based planning and management <br /> <br />1 <br />