READS LANDING, Minn. — The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers plans to lay a 6,000-foot pipe as a slurry for river-bottom-muck from Reads Landing to a gravel pit at Wabasha. The muck needs to be dredged and moved somewhere to maintain the navigation channel at nine feet near the Chippewa River delta from Wisconsin into the Mississippi at Reads Landing, the Corp said. The pipe would be plastic and 24 inches in diameter. The slurry line would be used three weeks a year during the dredging season and be cleaned and capped when not in use, the Corps said. . Previously the Corps trucked Reads Landin muck to the gravel pit, which is north of Wabasha. The plan still needs various approvals. The Corps invited public comment by March 24 at: Corps.
Navigation choke point. Wabasha is in yellow just downriver from the confluence of the Mississippi and Chippewa rivers. The Chippewa’s alluvial plain keeps bringing Wisconsin sediment into the Mississippi. Reads Landing, like Wabasha, is on the Minnesota side four miles north of Wabasha.
Problematic geography
The Chippewa River flows onto the Mississippi upstream from Wabasha. Over the centuries, a delta has built up. The delta, in effect, is natural dam that created Lake Pepin. The delta, also, has narrowed the Mississippi near Reads Landing, which is a continuing challenge for the Army Corps. The Corps is charged with maintaining s navigation channel for barges on the Mississippi This requires annual dredging. But what then to do with dredged sediment?