The Big Quilcene River Linger Longer Feasibility Study will assess the viability/feasibility of projects identified by multi-agency staff and community members in the Summer Chum Salmon Conservation Initiative and Big Quilcene Comprehensive Flood Plan. They identify remedies and habitat recovery recommendations to be assessed and prioritized in the proposed study. Potential remedies to be evaluated are purchasing riverfront properties from willing sellers, subsequent dike setbacks, extending or lengthening the Linger Longer Bridge, and constructing a designed floodway. The study will produce an evaluation of remedies and a prioritized project list leading to and forming the basis for habitat restoration projects within the study area.

The proposed study area is in summer chum spawning grounds. The channel is narrowly diked with little channel complexity and unstable spawning gravel. It routinely experiences flooding events, causing chum redd scouring/burying and out of channel flow. Also, the delta has been aggrading, adversely affecting the estuary used by summer chum and chinook for migration and feeding. The generally poor habitat condition adversely impacts spawning, incubation, juvenile rearing and migration life stages for summer chum, coho, steelhead and cutthroat trout. This study provides the assessment needed to address limiting factors in the proper sequence and to the proper extent and leads to the next steps of project design and construction.

Update: See completed Feasibility Study documents attached on right. The final study document assesses the feasibility and compatibility of flood management and habitat restoration proposals contained in the Big Quilcene Comprehensive Flood Hazard Management Plan (1998), the Summer Chum Conservation Initiative (2000), and other available documents. The study evaluated 7 configuration of levee setbacks and flow conveyance (by bridge or culverts) under Linger Longer Road. The study is limited to the Linger Longer reach in the areas of Rodgers Street to just downstream of the Linger Longer Bridge.