Posted on April 23, 2017 by Lilia Cabello Drain

County floodplain managers work together to understand a fast-moving river

On a gray day last month, a small group of King County and King County Flood Control District (Flood District) employees stood on the forested edge of the Tolt River upstream of Carnation.

Geologically speaking, this is a young river – sinuous, fast-moving and largely unconstrained as it courses from its headwaters in the Cascades to its confluence with the wide, slow-moving Snoqualmie River.

Chase Barton, an engineer with the King County’s River and Floodplain Management (Rivers) Section in the Water and Land Resources Division (WLRD), looked out across the swirling water. “This portion is the most rapidly migrating river of those we manage in King County,” he said.

Sometimes, the County’s goal is to use engineering tools to manage a river. “Here,” Chase said, “our goal is to get people out of harm’s way.”