At the turn of the century, three great urban planners had a common vision for the East Bay’s cities. They saw streams flowing freely, bordered by parklands that would weave through the urban landscape like lush green ribbons and connect with bayside and hilltop parklands.

Frederick Law Olmsted, Charles Mulford Robinson, and Werner Hegemann urged Oakland, Berkeley, and other cities to acquire strips of land 100 to 500 feet wide along the creeks while the land was still undeveloped and relatively cheap. Robinson, for example, recommended that Oakland connect these riparian strips into a park around Lake Merritt—a much larger one than now exists. With a few exceptions, however, their suggestions were ignored. Instead, most of the East Bay’s streams were buried in culverts or constrained in concrete channels, as were many other urban creeks in California.

In the early 1980s the seeds of a movement to protect what was left of these hidden waterways—and to uncover them where possible—began to sprout throughout the state. Today, California has more than 100 “friends of creeks” groups engaged in activities ranging from basic preservation to volunteer monitoring, educational and community awareness programs, and restoration.

The hearth of the urban streams movement is Berkeley. One of the first streams in the country to be “daylighted” is located here.

Creeks have recently been uncovered in Minnesota, Colorado, Illinois, Georgia, and Washington, and similar projects are proposed in Massachusetts, Oregon, and Pennsylvania. Closer to home, the City of Arcata uncovered Jolly Giant Creek, while in Los Angeles, activists and nonprofit organizations are trying to free stretches of the Los Angeles River from their concrete straitjacket and to reinvigorate a proposal made in the 1930s by two of Olmsted’s sons for a Los Angeles River greenway.

At the second Western Urban Streams Conference, in San Luis Obispo April 11–13, it was obvious that a growing number of governments and public agencies are realizing that free-flowing creeks are not only public amenities, they also can carry stormwater at least as effectively as storm drains, and with lesser maintenance costs. Open creeks with vegetated banks also help to filter urban runoff, improving the quality of the water that eventually finds its way to bays and oceans, says Don Freitas of the Contra Costa County Clean Water Program. Creekside vegetation can absorb sediment and take up pollutants, while concrete channels and culverts do neither. And ironically, while culverts and channels are designed to move water from one place to another as quickly as possible, they frequently become clogged with trash and cause flooding. Both Berkeley and Oakland have adopted ordinances to protect open creeks from activities that would destroy their natural vegetation or inhibit their flows. The Berkeley ordinance also prevents development within 20 feet of the top of creek banks.

In many other cities and counties, public works officials still find it hard to believe that riparian or creekside vegetation can be more effective than riprap and concrete in stabilizing banks or providing flood control (see p. 29). But citizen activists are prompting institutions to change, says Ann Riley, a pioneer in the urban streams movement. She is the founder and leader of the Waterways Restoration Institute, probably the most active professional stream restoration group in the country, and has led several workshops for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and other public agencies on restoration techniques. The Corps—long considered an enemy of free-flowing waterways—now has bioengineering and other less damaging concepts in its repertoire.

Among cities, Oakland is leading the way in making creek care part of official city business. It has created several staff positions devoted to improving and protecting the city's creeks. One employee has the full-time task of responding to complaints of illicit dumping or discharges into the creeks. Others are responsible for community awareness programs, holding workshops on erosion control for creekside property owners, and supervising students in the City’s youth job program, Team Oakland, in creek work. The Team cleans out trash and removes invasive, alien plants—particularly ivy, scotch broom, and acacia—and replaces them with natives.

Can more urban streams be rescued and reclaimed as city amenities? The opportunity to create the cityscapes envisioned by Olmsted, Robinson, and Hegemann is gone, but what has happened in the past few years is clear evidence that the story isn’t over. These stretches of wildness will only appreciate in value in today’s urban world, where natural areas have all but disappeared. As more urban residents reconnect with these revitalized waterways, and more planners and policy makers perceive urban streams as something of value, the natural landscape could once again become an integral part of our cities.

Lisa Owens-Viani is assistant editor of California Wild magazine.