Case study:Habitat improvements in the upper Kennet

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Project overview

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Status	In progress
Project web site
Themes	Habitat and biodiversity, Social benefits, Water quality
Country	England
Main contact forename	Charlotte
Main contact surname	Hitchmough
Main contact user ID
Contact organisation
Contact organisation web site
Partner organisations	Action for the River Kennet (ARK), Marlborough Town Council, Marlborough Area Development Trust, local volunteer and community groups
Parent multi-site project
This is a parent project encompassing the following projects	No

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Project summary

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The project to enable fish to swim through Marlborough will build a new channel linking the existing main river with a backstream, which currently flows intermittently down a cascade that is impassable to fish. The new channel will have a gentle gradient which will allow fish, including brown trout and grayling to swim up and down it. This is phase two of a project to link the river above and below Marlborough. The river above Marlborough is a valuable spawning habitat, but all the fish here died during the 2011/12 drought. Joining the two sections of river should improve the fish populations up and downstream. The habitat restoration projects use relatively simple techniques and materials and a considerable portion of the work will be done by volunteers. The work will repair eroded parts of the bank and create meanders and changes in flow which will create a more diverse environment to suit a variety of fish species and life stages. By fencing livestock away from the river the project will reduce bank erosion and keep sediment out of the river as a result. This keeps the natural gravel bed clean, leaving it clear for fish spawning and healthy weed growth. We will improve water quality, by diverting urban runoff from the road into a reedbed, which will filter out pollutants before the water reaches the river.

Monitoring surveys and results

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Lessons learnt

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Catchment and subcatchment

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Site

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Name	Kennet
WFD water body codes
WFD (national) typology
WFD water body name
Pre-project morphology
Reference morphology
Desired post project morphology
Heavily modified water body	No
National/international site designation
Local/regional site designations
Protected species present	No
Invasive species present	No
Species of interest
Dominant hydrology
Dominant substrate
River corridor land use
Average bankfull channel width category
Average bankfull channel width (m)
Average bankfull channel depth category
Average bankfull channel depth (m)
Mean discharge category
Mean annual discharge (m3/s)
Average channel gradient category
Average channel gradient
Average unit stream power (W/m2)

Project background

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Reach length directly affected (m)
Project started
Works started
Works completed
Project completed
Total cost category	100 - 500 k€
Total cost (k€)	104104 k€ <br />104,000 € <br />
Benefit to cost ratio
Funding sources	Catchment Restoration Funds

Cost for project phases

Phase	cost category	cost exact (k€)	Lead organisation	Contact forename	Contact surname
Investigation and design
Stakeholder engagement and communication
Works and works supervision
Post-project management and maintenance
Monitoring

Reasons for river restoration

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Mitigation of a pressure	Erosion
Hydromorphology
Biology	Fish
Physico-chemical
Other reasons for the project

Measures

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Structural measures
Bank/bed modifications
Floodplain / River corridor	Creation of new meander
Planform / Channel pattern
Other
Non-structural measures
Management interventions
Social measures (incl. engagement)	Local schools will use the Stonebridge and Og sites as an educational resource.
Other	Local people will be connected to their river, either because they have volunteered to work on the project or because they can now walk along a section of river which was previously inaccessible.

Monitoring

Hydromorphological quality elements

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quality elements

Element	When monitored		Type of monitoring		Control site used	Result
	Before measures	After measures	Qualitative	Quantitative

Biological quality elements

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quality elements

Element	When monitored		Type of monitoring		Control site used	Result
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Physico-chemical quality elements

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quality elements

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Any other monitoring, e.g. social, economic

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Element	When monitored		Type of monitoring		Control site used	Result
	Before measures	After measures	Qualitative	Quantitative

Monitoring documents

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Image gallery

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During works

Additional documents and videos

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Stand up for the Kennet web version.pdf

Additional links and references

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Link	Description

Supplementary Information

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