Au Sable Restoration through the Grayling Stormwater Project

Stormwater runoff, carrying sediment, oils, greases, trash, and other hazardous material, currently discharges from city street and parking lots directly into the Au Sable River.

Historically, in Grayling and most other cities, the stormwater approach has been to dispose of runoff in the quickest manner possible, with little regard for its subsequent impact on natural resources. Where natural vegetation and soils once intercepted runoff, impervious surfaces (such as roads, parking lots, and building) now send runoff directly to the river. The natural filtering effect of the land is lost, and the river shows the symptoms.

What's Being Done?

Controlling water from rain events and snowmelt, close to where the rainfall actually lands on the ground, is the key concept behind efforts to eliminate the direct discharge of stormwater runoff from the land to the Au Sable River. while the problem may not be unique to Grayling, the Au Sable River is!

Techniques called Best Management Practices will be used for treating what comes out of the end of drainage pipes. In addition to the traditional approach to the problem, Grayling has been selected as a pilot project site to demonstrate Low Impact Development techniques for reducing stormwater runoff. The end-of-the-pipe treatment will still be needed in some areas, but the use of low impact, natural drainage should help address the problem at its source. The uniqueness of the AuSable River merits an exceptional approach to the problem.

The basic principles behind natural drainage include maintaining natural vegetation wherever possible, intercepting rainfall with tree canopy, minimizing pavement where practical, disconnecting areas of impervious surfaces to increase opportunities for infiltration, directing water to depression areas, and detaining water close to where it falls. The above principles are used in conjunction with one another to control stormwater at its source and thus reduce the quantity of runoff.

An example of the natural drainage approach is to direct water form the road into open swales within the road right of way. Vegetated swales help to slow stormwater runoff and convey it to rain gardens, where soil and plants can bio-remediate the problem. this and other Low Impact Development strategies are based on simple concepts that have been left out of most conventional developments in our rush to grow.

Project Links

Click here to watch the project video

Download 2007 project update poster -- 1.8 MB

Download recent project update -- 380 KB

The Grayling Rain Gardens

More Low Impact Development Information

Project Funding

Funding for the Grayling Stormwater Project has been provided through a $758,000 Clean Michigan Initiative grant administered by the Michigan Department of Environmental Quality. 

Key project sponsors include the City of Grayling ($127,000)

Michigan Department of Transportation ($90,000)

Trout Bum Bar-B-Q ($59,263)

Michigan Fly Fishing Club ($19,100)

Paul Young Chapter of Trout Unlimited ($19,000)

Additional support has been provided by the Upper Au Sable River Preservation Association ($6,000), Kalamazoo Valley Chapter of Trout Unlimited through their Stanley Weber Projects Fund ($5,000), Mason Griffith Chapter of Trout Unlimited ($3,000), Crawford County ($3,000), Elliot Donnelley Chapter of Trout Unlimited ($1,750), Ray's Canoeing and the Fly Factory ($1,500), Spikes Keg of Nails ($1,196), William B. Mershon Chapter of Trout Unlimited ($1,000),  the Lee Wulff Chapter of Trout Unlimited ($150), as well as other individual donors ($1,055).