Birds, insects and turtles are thriving on land that was once a toxic waste dump in Cuyahoga Valley National Park, the 33,000-acre park along the Cuyahoga River — "the river that burned" — between Akron and Cleveland, Ohio. It is a story of two transformations: of the land itself, and of how the National Park Service deals with contamination, making sure public land is restored and that those responsible pay.
Before
When the Park Service acquired the 50-acre property in the 1980s, it knew it had been a scrapyard. Once it owned the site, it found a far worse problem: people were getting sick, and the wetlands, groundwater, plants and animals were devastated. Over the following years, tons of contaminated soil and thousands of drums of extremely hazardous chemicals — PCBs, dioxins, arsenic and other heavy metals and carcinogens — were removed. All a visitor could see then were signs reading "KEEP OUT – DO NOT ENTER."
Before: the scrapyard behind its fence, and the rusted metal that littered the property. NPS.
After
The Park Service spent more than 25 years investigating the contamination, cleaning up the site, restoring its habitats and wetlands, and making the responsible parties pay. Native plants are back, and the wetlands and the species they support are thriving. In high summer, visitors look out over native wildflowers and grasses, watch turtles sunning on floating logs, and hear birds singing.
After: the restored wetland, and turtles sunning on a log in it. NPS.
What changed
The cleanup also changed people, laws and practice — how the Park Service and other land agencies protect and restore their land.
- Laws. Strong federal laws and enforcement programs now guard against improper disposal of hazardous waste.
- Process. When contaminated land is found in a park, the Park Service follows a thorough, well-defined assessment and cleanup process, including legal action against those who caused the contamination.
- Acquisition. Land must now be properly evaluated before the agency accepts it.
More to do
Cuyahoga Valley is not the only success, but more than 500 potentially contaminated sites lie on Park Service land. The agency's online map shows them: green stars for sites cleaned and restored, red diamonds for those still to be cleaned, each with its size and type.
Sources
- National Park Service, "A Story of Transformation — Toxic Dump to Thriving Pastoral Wetlands: How the National Park Service Built a Cleanup Practice." https://www.nps.gov/articles/cuyahoga_valley_cleanup.htm
- NPS, "Removing Toxins at Krejci Dump": https://www.nps.gov/articles/000/removing-toxins-at-krejci-dump.htm
- Conservancy for Cuyahoga Valley National Park, "From Toxic Waste to Sunflowers": https://www.conservancyforcvnp.org/wp-content/uploads/2017/09/Magazine_Fall15-Winter16.pdf
In these publicationsCuyahoga Valley National Park
Licence: CC0 1.0 (public domain) · Adapted from www.nps.gov
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