Green River Lock & Dam 5
KWA has been working for decades to protect and restore the Green River, Kentucky’s longest interior river and home to an amazing diversity of fish and mussels, 43 of which are found nowhere else in the world. We are part of a team that includes the US Fish & Wildlife Service, US Army Corps of Engineers, Mammoth Cave National Park, KY Department of Fish & Wildlife Resources, The Nature Conservancy, and many local, state and federal elected officials. In the summer of 2021, removal operations began at Lock & Dam 5 near Reedyville in Butler and Warren Counties. Work continued into the fall, but was paused during the winter. The locks are demolished and part of the dam is out. Work resumed in June 2022 and we have high hopes that it will be completed this year. We will keep you updated on this website with more information.
Green River Lock & Dam 6
In 2017, this same team removed Lock & Dam 6 near Brownsville.
Dams were built along the Green River and its tributaries in the early 1900s to allow barges to travel its waters, carrying cargo such as minerals mined in the region and passengers to see the caverns of Mammoth Cave. These dams operated up into the 1950s. Dams greatly change the flow of a river and this affects its wildlife. Fish and mussels, linked as they are in their life cycles. Kentucky Waterways Alliance works to protect, restore, and celebrate the waterways of Kentucky and has a special connection to the Green. For many years, our office was in the watershed and we have always had projects there. It has been a dream for KWA and many other groups that love the river that some of the old defunct dams could be removed so the river could be free flowing, the wildlife could thrive, and paddling would be safer and easier
In 2016, we finally saw an opening. Working with The Nature Conservancy, US Fish & Wildlife Service, US Army Corps of Engineers, Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife, and many others, a plan was developed to remove three dams. Then, on Thanksgiving weekend last year, Green River Dam 6 failed. It did not break apart, but rather developed a scour hole beneath it. It was a dangerous situation and that I brought Corps of Engineers funding.
In April, an amazing crew of dam busters from the US Fish & Wildlife Service came in with their concrete breakers and trackhoes. They worked for two weeks from daylight to dusk. eventually demolishing the 220-foot long dam and filling that scour hole. The equipment operators said that they thought there was a cave down there.
Now the river is flowing free for nine miles of the Green and into passages of the Mammoth Cave National Park. The mussels and fish are able to move into new habitat.
Just after the last blow to the dam destroyed it forever, a great blue heron flew into view from downstream, circled the now-free river, and lighted in the water to herald the restored river.
Dams were built along the Green River and its tributaries in the early 1900s to allow barges to travel its waters, carrying cargo such as minerals mined in the region and passengers to see the caverns of Mammoth Cave. These dams operated up into the 1950s. Dams greatly change the flow of a river and this affects its wildlife. Fish and mussels, linked as they are in their life cycles. Kentucky Waterways Alliance works to protect, restore, and celebrate the waterways of Kentucky and has a special connection to the Green. For many years, our office was in the watershed and we have always had projects there. It has been a dream for KWA and many other groups that love the river that some of the old defunct dams could be removed so the river could be free flowing, the wildlife could thrive, and paddling would be safer and easier
In 2016, we finally saw an opening. Working with The Nature Conservancy, US Fish & Wildlife Service, US Army Corps of Engineers, Mammoth Cave National Park, Kentucky Department of Fish & Wildlife, and many others, a plan was developed to remove three dams. Then, on Thanksgiving weekend last year, Green River Dam 6 failed. It did not break apart, but rather developed a scour hole beneath it. It was a dangerous situation and that I brought Corps of Engineers funding.
In April, an amazing crew of dam busters from the US Fish & Wildlife Service came in with their concrete breakers and trackhoes. They worked for two weeks from daylight to dusk. eventually demolishing the 220-foot long dam and filling that scour hole. The equipment operators said that they thought there was a cave down there.
Now the river is flowing free for nine miles of the Green and into passages of the Mammoth Cave National Park. The mussels and fish are able to move into new habitat.
Just after the last blow to the dam destroyed it forever, a great blue heron flew into view from downstream, circled the now-free river, and lighted in the water to herald the restored river.