Resilience Spotlight: Willow Creek revitalization supports human and ecological health

Pedestrians walk across a Willow Creek bridge as rising water from Lake Mendota floods the University Bay shoreline.

Willow Creek is the entrance point to the Yahara lakes from a nearly 2,000-acre urban watershed. A new green infrastructure project stopped more than 400 tons of sediment (including dangerous algal blooming phosphorus) from entering the Yahara watershed, thereby protecting human and ecological health. The project was jointly funded between UW–Madison and the City of Madison. More about Willow Creek and other campus green infrastructure projects and practices are included at the Department of Campus Planning and Landscape Architecture’s Green Infrastructure website.