The Dutch Are Much: Governance and Making Space for the River

• Author: G. Tracy Mehan III
• Pages: 203-206

203

The Dutch Are Much:

Governance and Making

Space for the River

By G. Tracy Mehan III

Making Spac e for the River: Gover nance Experiences Wi th

Multifunctio nal River Flood Management i n the U.S. and

Europe, edited by Jeroen Fr ank Warner, Arwin van Buuren, and Jurian

Edelenbos. IWA Publishing. 201 pages.

From the September/ October 2013 issue of The Environmental Forum .

I

grew up in St. Louis on the Big Riv-

ers. I reca ll bei ng hustled out of my

dormitory one day during law school

to join a sand-bagging part y at West

Alton, Missouri, near the conuence of

the Missouri and Mississippi, during

a big ood. Stack ing sandba gs over my

head, and viewing the torrent of water

at eye level, was a sobering experience,

indeed. Nature wa s an awesome, fearf ul

thing from t hat vantage.

I left Missouri and the Department of

Natural Resources in 1992, just before the

next wave of massive oods. In the sum-

mer of 2006 or 2007, memory fails me, I

drove throug h Chestereld, Missouri, in

western St. Louis County, to cross the Missouri River into neighboring St.

Charles County. is was not far from my sand-bagging experience. is

area was once all open oodplain a nd farm crops with one general aviation

airport. I recal l slumming around at a polo match there many years ago.

I was shocked, shocked by the massive development on the oodplain

behind extensive new dikes and levees. It was the a ntithesis of every sound

policy recommendation, by legions of technical experts, in light of everything