Urban Streams

Article in Coastwatch - Teacher Study Questions - Web Resources

Urban Stream Restoration focuses on the Rocky Branch stream restoration project. In this, the first segment of the Coastwatch on North Carolina Now series, producer Heather Burgiss looks at how restoring urban streams in North Carolina is improving the state's water quality and enhancing city landscapes. From Raleigh's Rocky Branch to Charlotte's Little Sugar Creek, the segment explores how buried streams are receiving major facelifts as scientists and engineers work together to turn once-polluted streams into healthy and viable resources. Urban Stream Restoration further examines how these projects are restoring stream habitats with native plants and animals. The feature also looks at the process of natural channel design, as well as a fairly new technique called "daylighting" - the process of excavating water pipes and exposing buried streams to sunlight.

Curriculum Alignment for North Carolina Standard Course of Study (8th Grade Science) - The segment Urban Stream Restoration is aligned to NCSCS's 8th grade science curriculum in the following areas:

• 1.08, 1.09, 2.02 – Scientific inquiry and technological design
• 3.02 – Structure of the hydrosphere, local river basins
• 3.04 – Interconnection of terrestrial and aquatic food webs
• 3.05 – Analyzing hydrospheric data
• 3.06, 3.07, 3.08 – Evaluating information systems, impact of humans on water quality including point and nonpoint pollution, impact of scientific and technological advances, and monitoring the hydrosphere