Pond A4 Resilient Habitat Restoration Project

Pond A4 Resilient Habitat Restoration Project

The Project would restore pond-upland ecotone habitat along the southern shoreline of Pond A4 by beneficially reusing sediment from Valley Water’s Stream Maintenance Program (SMP) and potentially other soil/sediment sources. The Project would construct an approximately 350 feet wide by 4,500 feet long shallow-water shorebird foraging habitat bench along the south (landward) edge of Pond A4 (Figure 1). The habitat bench would provide approximately 38 acres of new shorebird foraging habitat by converting deep open water to shallow open water/mudflat (Figure 2). The primary function of the restored habitat would be a shallow-water shorebird foraging mudflat positioned on a habitat bench slightly below the existing ordinary high-water mark (OHWM), created by raising the pond bottom. The habitat bench would provide new foraging habitat for shorebirds, including western snowy plover, under the current, managed hydrologic conditions in Pond A4. The project’s proposed shorebird foraging habitat would be resilient to sea level rise because it would be situated in a non-tidal pond protected with existing berms. Valley Water would continue to maintain Pond A4’s diked condition, along with its managed hydroperiod and water quality parameters during and after implementation of the Project. To construct the habitat bench, SMP sediment that meets applicable standards for beneficial reuse would be delivered to Pond A4 during the summer and fall (typically June through November), as available, over the next 10 to 15 years. To facilitate sediment delivery, an existing access road running from Caribbean Drive to the edge of the pond would be widened from 15 feet to approximately 35 feet through installation of a retaining wall and placement of fill material between the retaining wall and the existing maintenance road surface (Figure 1). A sediment staging area would be constructed along the southern border of the pond. This staging area would allow trucks to offload fill material for storage and turn around. Once delivered, the staging area would be used to temporarily store fill until it could be placed as part of the habitat bench (Figure 1). The staging area would be approximately 1.1 acres in size.

San Jose, Sunnyvale

Santa Clara

San Francisco Bay Area

Santa Clara