The Santa Fe River Journey

Follow the path of an essential river system in New Mexico from the headwaters to below the City of Santa Fe

Rich Schrader

February 6, 2023

Introduction

This Storymap presents photos, videos, stories, and policy issues for the heavily-utilized Santa Fe River in northern New Mexico based on years of work by River Source and the engagement of many of participants and partners in our programs. River Source supports people living as good stewards of their watersheds (click here for more info) by providing science and policy education, planning, monitoring, and ecological restoration services throughout New Mexico since 1997. We recognize and honor the first inhabitants who first settled in the area, still live here and call the nearby river “’Ogap’oge” or “Hashuk Cheena,” the original names given by the Tewa and Keres peoples respectively to what is now known as the Santa Fe River.

The Upper Canyon of the Santa Fe River

The Santa Fe River starts in the southern Sangre de Cristo Mountains near Lake Peak in land co-managed by the City of Santa Fe and the US Forest Service. Access to this land is strictly limited as it provides about 4,000 to 5,000 acre feet of drinking water to City residents on a good water year. On dry years the river provides much less water (~1,000 acre feet) such as the year when the photo to the right was taken in 2020 showing McClure Reservoir.

Notice the good forest cover surrounding the reservoir, showing how forest thinning can happen in ways that still retain a healthy forest. The City has done significant work with the US Forest Service forest thinning and prescribed burning in the watershed to reduce the risk of a catastrophic fire that could fill the reservoir with sediment and ash and damage the water supply.

River Source partners with the City of Santa Fe to reducing soil erosion, harvesting stormwater, monitoring water quality with students and watershed crew members. Check out this video where crew members describe their experience in the Watershed Academy where they get paid to learn and get exposure to job pathways in watershed science, hydrology, river ecology and community service.

Further downstream the Santa Fe River enters the the Santa Fe Canyon Preserve which is owned and managed by The Nature Conservancy (TNC). TNC obtained the land from the Public Service Company of New Mexico (PNM) by donation in the 1990s. PNM formerly ran the City's water supply system before the City bought the utility from the company. For more information on the Preserve, click here !

In the early 2000's the Santa Fe Watershed Association worked with TNC to design and build a river restoration project that returned the river's flow to it's historical location. The project feeds a series of ponds to keep the freshwater stream alive instead of running the water in bypass ditch that is entrenched and lacks good wildlife habitat just below Canyon Road. Unfortunately, current City policymakers (as of 2023) believe they are obligated to run the river through the bypass ditch with very eroded banks, leaving the historic channel of the Santa Fe River dry and the pond lacking in freshwater flowing through it. We public pressure and better management, we hope the City can be convinced to leave more water in the historic river channel and use the bypass ditch less while still meeting the needs of the City, local acequia water users, and the wildlife on the Santa Fe Canyon Preserve.

Rich Schrader visited the Preserve in March 2020 soon after the COVID pandemic began and captured the marvelous sounds of Redwinged blackbirds which had just migrated back to the Preserve for the spring and summer. You can see them every year near the edges of the pond and hear the recording Rich when he saw them them swirling in flight and singing in a murmuration.

Red Winged Blackbirds at SF Canyon Preserve on Eve of Coronovirus

The Urbanized River

The Santa Fe River enters the urbanized section of the City of Santa Fe below the Preserve when it crosses Cerro Gordo Road. At this point the flow in the river diminishes significantly due to the diversion of water for the municipal water supply. Fortunately, the City Council and Mayor David Coss agreed to create the Living River Ordinance in 2012 which Rich Schrader was able to participate in the advisory group to set the target flows. In wet years, the river will get up to 1,000 acre feet of flow released solely for the benefit of the river, the City residents and wildlife. Due to the geology of the watershed, the streamflow rarely gets much past Siler Road Bridge which is about the halfway point in the City. This means that people, plants and wildlife living on the west side of town rarely get to see the benefits from the Living River flow releases since the water percolates into the ground before it goes under Siler Bridge. In contrast, people living east of Siler have a better chance of getting to enjoy the riparian plants and the water that the City releases.

Stormwater in the urban reach creates rapid water runoff from hard, impervious surfaces in the City. In the past, Santa Fe was developed with very little thought of slowing, spreading and sinking water into the ground inside the City. The expanse of hard, paved, roofeed surfaces leads to fast running stormwater flows that can cause soil erosion in the river bed, it's banks and lead to pollution entering the water that impacts people and infrastructure nearby and downstream. River Source worked with intern Gaby Rael to survey the outflows for stormwater in the Santa Fe River and map the locations where concerns are present. Click on points on the map to see some of the areas of concern.

Stormwater flooding becomes a real concern when extreme weather such as massive storms hit the City at the same time we are experiencing a megadrought since 2000 to 2022. Here are some videos of a storm on July 23, 2018 that was labelled a historic event that would happen every 500 or 1,000 years. It rained about 3.5 inches in about one hour on the afternoon that day. Keep in mind that the City typically gets about 12 -14 inches of rain every year!

Santa Fe River Greenway flood July 23, 2018 at Frenchy's Footbridge

Santa Fe River floods, July 23, 2018, at desague of Acequia Madre

Santa Fe River Flood, July 23, 2018 at old Camino Carlos Rael crossing

The River has been the lifeblood of the community for millenia when Tewa and Keres Pueblos of Tesuque and Cochiti occupied the area and then later when Spanish colonized the area and farmed using over 38 acequias (irrigation ditches).

Improving River Conditions with a Park-like Setting and River Trail

When Rich Schrader first came to know the Santa Fe River in 1992, it was largely ignored or worse yet, was seen as a dumping ground and was driven through through several road crossings. Rich lived near the end of the historic Acequia de las Joyas and Barela Lane and would take walks up and down the River. The next set of slides show historic photos of the Santa Fe River before the River Trail was built from Camino Alire to Siler Road Bridge.

These four photos illustrate how cars would drive through the River at the old Camino Carlos Rael low water crossing, the tons of pipes, concrete and cars that filled the degraded channel, how huge erosion caused sheer unstable banks 25 feet tall and failed rock gabions grade controls we very unstable (see Bill Zeedyk and Chris Phillips standing where a large sewer pipeline crosses under the channel just upstream of a 16 foot drop off).

Mayor David Coss and the County of Santa Fe decided in 2007 to significantly invest in building a river trail along the length of the river and put out a RFP to bidders who would get the project started. The vision is for a trail that will hopefully will go all the way to Highway 599. River Source was hired as part of a team to lead the river restoration portion of the project and we ended up assembling a great team of river restoration practitioners including Bill Zeedyk, Steve Vrooman, Craig Sponholtz, and Van Clothier. We worked for a team of engineers and landscape architects to submit our assessment of the current conditions and a design proposal. By 2011 a hybrid design was put to bid and a local contractor RL Leeder was chosen to build the project and Wild Earth Guardians, supported by hundreds of volunteers helped plant thousands of willows and cottonwoods after the earthwork was done.

When the earth moving and work to stabilize the river bed and streambanks with large rocks began, I was dismayed at how bare the area looked. The work was done during the extreme drought of 2011 and so the area was very dry and there was hardly and vegetation cover.

But soon after willow and cottonwood planting was done that started to green up. Water ran in the channel year round for two years to allow for the outlets of the two upstream reservoirs to be rebuilt. This helped create amazing success in establishing the newly planted willow and cottonwood poles done mostly by the Wild Earth Guardians staff plus many volunteers.

With the water flowing people came down to enjoy and occupy the River, particularly in the pools created just downstream of the cross vanes built to keep the river bed from eroding.

The willows grew well and helped create natural grout for many of the rock structures. I also learned over subsequent years and many large floods that if inexperienced companies build the structures, it is better to grout them as often they don't get built correctly the lowest bidders on a City RFP.

The River Trail really brought people together and helped out wildlife too. Hundreds of people helped to plant thousands of willows along the river banks over the years. Many groups helped lead the effort including River Source, Santa Fe Watershed Association, and WildEarth Guardians.

Volunteers planting willows at Frenchy's Field

A coyote taking a rest and cooling off in the Santa Fe River in 2012

The River Comes Alive Below the City with Treated Effluent

About 60% of the water used by Santa Fe residents gets treated at the Wastewater Treatment Plant (WWTP) near the Santa Fe Airport which creates a nearly year-round flow in the river whereas upstream it is dry most of the time in the City.

In 1992 when I arrived in Santa Fe the area below the WWTP was heavily grazed and supported very little vegetation. In the late 1990s the City and County of Santa Fe allowed the volunteers from around the City to work with the WildEarth Guardians to plant cottonwoods and willows in the area. The paired photographs gives an indication of the change that occured as soon the plantings succeeded in creating a very healthy wetland community that supported deer, elk, a wide variety of birds and even fish.

The Santa Fe River near La Cienguilla in 1997

The Santa Fe River near the same location in 2004

Before the City of Santa Fe treated wastewater and Cochiti Dam were completed in the late 1960s, the Santa Fe River would flow all the way down the lower Santa Fe Canyon and into Cochiti Pueblo lands to the Rio Grande. The USGS water data website shows a map of the historic flow pathway for the lower River.

From USGS Realtime Water Data at the Santa Fe River at La Bajada

The River was probably a perennial flowing river emerging from springs in the lower canyon and from water that wasn't used by irrigators in Santa Fe which had up to 38 separate acequias (irrigation ditches) historically. A photo from 1910 shows a flowing river flowing on near the Hispanic settlement of La Bajada towards the Rio Grande as shown in the photo below.

Now the surface water flow from Santa Fe River below the lower canyon gets intercepted by a large wing dam that is part of the Cochiti Dam that holds back the Rio Grande. Rarely, when flows are high enough in the Santa Fe River, it will flow into Cochiti Lake. More often, the Santa Fe River will get diverted by farmers in La Bajada and the remainder flows into a wet meadow just above the wing dam where it evaporates, seeps into the ground to feed springs below the dam on Cochiti Pueblo or it gets used by plants instead of flowing as surface water to the Rio Grande.

Prior to the current Paseo Real WWTP being built near the airport, wastewater was treated at a facility near Siler Road and discharged into the Santa Fe River. The wastewater entered the River above the village of Agua Fria which refers to the cold water springs that fed the river, a Native American settlement by the spring, and later a Hispanic farming community. When the WWTP was moved west to where it was now, the location of the discharged water moved to the southwest.

Some people believe that the lower Santa Fe River near La Cieneguilla has a lot more water in it today than was there historically. The reasoning is based on the belief a lot of farmers historically diverted water for farming, thus drying up the river, whereas now the farms are gone and the WWTP is releasing or selling 60% of the treated effluent water used in in the River southwest of town. Since we don't have many recordings of streamflow or evidence of how much flow existed before except for some sporadic historic photos, we don't really know the facts of how much the Paseo Real WWTP has changed the stream flows compared to the past.

Besides, people downstream have become accustomed to having the current streamflow patterns and even invested in roads, infrastructure and farms based on the current flows. And the flows from the City WWTP already vary a lot from 2 cubic feet per second in the summer when lots of treated effluent gets sold or contracted out to over 10 cubic feet per second in the winter when golf courses don't call for the effluent water. We analyzed several years of discharge from the Paseo Real WWTP records in 2011 and 2012 and the graphs show large changes by hour of the day and month of the year.

This graph compares 2011 to 2012 treated effluent discharge data averaged by month

We graphed data by the peak and low flow by hour over 10 different months in 2012

The City is now proposing to pump about 50% + of the wastewater to the Buckman Direct Diversion (BDD) and release it into the Rio Grande to get return flow credit. The City is planning on building an pipeline for treated wastewater effluent from the WWTP to the Rio Grande where the water gets diverted out the Rio Grande by the BDD so that the City can return water back to the diversion location. This would enable the City to pump more water out of the Rio Grande, an additional gallon for every gallon of returned wastewater, gallon for gallon, albeit the water quality will be different upon its return than when it was originally taken out. Current wastewater treatment practices leaves many elements that City cannot current remove like viruses, pharmaceuticals, caffeine, antidepressants, birth control medicines, and more.

People living downstream are not very happy about this proposal because it means the lower Santa Fe River will be a lot drier than it is now by 50% as it travels below the City. The reduction in flow would have negative impacts on downstream farmers, tribal communities and wildlife. In 2023 the County of Santa Fe will be holding a public input process on the proposed Wastewater/Return Flow Pipeline and you can voice your opinion on whether this is a good idea -- keep an eye out for how to get involved!

In 2011 River Source worked with students from the Santa Fe Indian School to document beavers who were using the growth of willows and trees by the River to build dams and slow the water down.

SFIS students documented that wetland habitats with ponds grew by about 12 acres in a period of about 3 years as the beavers began cutting the willows, cottonwoods and cattails to create ponds which eventually started filling up with water and sediment.

The beaver ponds grew about 12 acres in 3 years, slowing the water down, increasing recharge into the aquifer, and creating diverse wildlife habitat on public lands downstream of the the WWTP. This has been controversial for some people who claimed that the beavers were illegally "impounding" the water. One major challenge is that during the summer when farmers need water, the City is sending wastewater to three nearby golf courses instead of allowing it to flow downstream.

Get involved in shaping the future journey of the Santa Fe River

The City and County of Santa Fe are making plans for continuing to develop aspects of the Santa Fe River and to make sure those decisions are well informed by what people want to see, we need to get involved. Here are some resources to get engaged!

Check out and support River Source's work in the Santa Fe area and in northern New Mexico (https://riversource.net/) including education, research/monitoring and watershed restoration work!

Support the Santa Fe Watershed Association, the local group doing river cleanups, watershed planning, education, and community organizing!

Inform yourself on water policy issues related to the Wastewater/Return Flow Pipeline (Summary of City funded feasibility study)

Learn about water conservation, a key strategy for City of Santa Fe residents to reduce water use to make sure our water supply is as secure as possible.

River Restoration References

Let the Water do the Work: Induced Meandering, an Evolving Method for Restoring Incised River Channels by Bill Zeedyk and Van Clothier

Erosion Control Field Guide by Avery Anderson and Craig Sponholtz