Army Corps of Engineers seeks feedback on Chartiers watershed options
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Pittsburgh District launched a trio of public feedback sessions this week on a range of potential options to reduce flood damage in the Chartiers Creek Watershed.
More than 30 residents and local officials stopped by the Canonsburg Borough Building on Tuesday afternoon to comment on four potential project directions.
The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (USACE) began a comprehensive feasibility study on the watershed in April, with the goal of producing a range of project recommendations by the end of 2026.
According to USACE Project Manager Anthony Schneider, his team has already completed an initial hydrological analysis of the 48-mile long watershed that covers southern Allegheny and northern Washington counties that encompasses more than 250,000 residents.
This includes identifying which sections of the creek are most flood-prone and vulnerable to future flood events.
Now, the team has prepared four potential options to reduce the risk to human life and economic damage due to flooding in the region.
The four options presented represent a mixture of both structural and nonstructural, or community-education based options to improve flood resilience.
According to Schneider, the first “Cornerstone Maximum” option offers the most infrastructure-intensive approach, which would include full-length levees and flood walls built along several key sections of the creek.
The second and third options – “Life Safety Maximum” and “Life Safety Focused,” respectively – indicate less physical infrastructure overall, with only limited projects deployed at the most vulnerable areas.
The fourth option, known as “Community Resilience,” would include an absolute minimum of new construction through the watershed, and would focus on more holistic options like riparian buffer restoration, public education and flood preparedness measures.
Schneider said his team will digitally model each option to determine which will present the greatest decrease in flood risk to human safety and economic impact, and select one option to recommend for further development by the end of 2026.
The recommendation will include a 30-day public comment period for additional community input on specific aspects of the proposed plan.
After this period, the USACE Pittsburgh team will begin designing individual project components included in the overall plan, which Schneider estimates will be finished sometime in 2028.
This timeline is still tentative, Schneider said, since public feedback could cause the USACE to rework the presented options or pursue another option entirely.
Schneider could not offer a specific cost estimate for the overall project, since it depends on which of the four options is chosen.
Once the recommendation is made, the USACE leadership will review the recommended plan and refine the plan an additional time, before generating a final Chief’s Report to present to Congress for funding.
Schneider estimated that his team is about halfway finished with the initial feasibility study.
Another meeting was held Wednesday at the Carnegie Borough Building, with the third and final event scheduled for 1:30 p.m. at the McKees Rocks Borough Building in McKees Rocks on Thursday.
Residents can find additional study information and submit feedback online at https://www.lrd.usace.army.mil/Missions/Planning/Display/Article/4498576/chartiers-creek-study/