Parks Restoring Wildlife Habitat in Little Menomonee River Parkway

Milwaukee County Parks is in line to receive $3 million from the state for a habitat restoration project in the Little Menomonee River Parkway.

The project is focused on rehabilitating fish and wildlife habitats along the river on the western edge of the county and the funding comes from the state Department of Natural Resources. The funds will cover work along the river, running north to south, between approximately W. County Line Rd. and W. Hampton Ave. and west of 98th St. on the far Northwest Side of Milwaukee.

The project is part of the department’s larger contribution to delisting the Milwaukee Estuary as an Area of Concern (AOC).  The estuary received the designation in 1987 for pollution and environmental degradation. Restoring plant and wildlife habitats along the Little Menomonee River Parkway is one of the many projects across the county being undertaken to remediate the conditions that led to the designation.

The project was identified in 2015 as “a necessary fish and wildlife restoration project,” said Erica Goblet, Parks contracts manager. The project area is broken up into a number of sections based on work that has been completed to date. Habitat restoration is already underway in some areas, while a restoration plan still needs to be developed in others.

This area is what the Southeastern Wisconsin Regional Planning Commission calls a “primary environmental corridor.” This means it is an “elongated” area with “concentrations of the best remaining elements of the natural resource base, including wetlands, woodlands, surface-water areas and associated undeveloped shorelands and floodplains, and wildlife habitat areas.”

The environmental degradation in this corridor is largely the result of historic agricultural practices with land being farmed right up to the riverbanks, according to a project report. The emerald ash borer and other plant and insect invasive species, as well as a high deer population, have also all contributed to degradation.

The aquatic habitats along the corridor have been similarly degraded by “historic draining and filling of wetlands, channelization of the riverbed, rapid stormwater run-off from impervious urban surfaces, and declining water quality from agriculture in the upper watershed.”

The DNR has informed Parks that the $3 million grant could be finalized by October. Parks is hoping to have the project completed by the end of 2026.