Ever since the North Avenue dam was torn down in 1998, the city has battled with Mother Nature and the forces of water to keep the river in check. The river is winning.

After the dam was removed, the channel upstream of it was lined with a concrete mat with open pockets so dirt could settle in and plants on the shoreline could grow through. It was called state-of-the-art then and hailed as an environmentally sound way to channelize a river without being terribly unsightly. The uneven surface also created a great place for whitewater canoeing and kayak surfing. But the first big rainstorm flooded the better part of the matting downriver.

The next step called for heavier mats, better anchors and bigger rocks. That's kind of worked until now, however, as the matting has deteriorated and chunks of it are actually creating boating hazards as flotsam is piling up in the channel.

The City of Milwaukee now appears to have grown tired of being environmentally sensitive and plans to essentially throw big rocks all over a new mat in the river and on the shore to keep everything from floating away. That doesn't sit too well with folks who actually recreate on the river.

In a letter to the Department of Natural Resources, Cheryl Nenn, Riverkeeper for the Friends of Milwaukee's Rivers, urges the parties involved to keep paddlers in mind when trying to tame the river in what is turning out to be a continuous effort. (The city had to go to court over the first failure.)

"Natural round stone is far preferable to many angular pieces of rip rap, which are very painful to walk on and through," writes Nenn.

FMR recently completed the Milwaukee Urban Water Trail, which highlights various access points along the river where people can launch or take out their boats. The North Avenue stretch is of particular import, since the stretch of river downstream of the bridge has a few standing waves that can wipe out the novice paddler.

In higher water it is still an exhilarating, albeit quite fast, run until clearing the site of the old dam. But it also creates the need for a decent well-marked portage so boaters can carry around it, since wiping out in the Milwaukee River is still an unpleasant thought.

"It is preferable to have stone that is easy to traverse and that won't 'cut up' paddlers, generally walking in wet, slippery shoes," Nenn says of the portage.

She also asked the DNR to make sure the chunks of the old matting are removed from the channel. The debris creates paddling hazards, she says.

The city also plans to again re-vegetate the area, hoping to use willows and native species. The first effort resulted in invasive species of weeds sprouting everywhere.

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