The Santa Clara Valley Water District (Valley Water) is committed to reducing the risk of flooding to homes, businesses, and schools and improving the environment by performing work along creeks across Santa Clara County. This work includes removing sediment build-up, managing vegetation, clearing trash and debris and stabilizing banks that have eroded during high water flows.
As part of this commitment, Valley Water will perform bank repairs and rehabilitation work in the City of Cupertino along Calabazas Creek between Miller Avenue and Bollinger Road. Under the Calabazas Creek Bank Rehabilitation Project, Valley Water will repair and stabilize damaged creek bank sections along portions of Calabazas Creek to their as-built or natural condition.
Public feedback
Valley Water is welcoming public comment on the project’s California Environmental Quality Act (CEQA) Mitigated Negative Declaration, which describes the project and its environmental impacts in detail. The document can be found by clicking the "Reports & Documents" tab above and is available for public review and comment between Friday, September 18th to Monday, October 19, 2020.
Comments on the Draft MND should be submitted by 5 p.m. on October 19, 2020, either electronically to [email protected] or via mail to:
Santa Clara Valley Water District
Attention: Alex Hunt
5750 Almaden Expressway
San Jose, CA 95118
For further information please contact Alex Hunt at (408) 630-3007, or by email at [email protected].
Project schedule
Construction on the project is expected to begin in spring 2022 with completion by fall 2023. As the project approaches, Valley Water will be notifying the community of the updated project schedule and impacts.
Under the Calabazas Creek Bank Rehabilitation Project, Valley Water will repair and stabilize damaged creek bank sections along portions of Calabazas Creek to their as-built or natural condition. Specifically, the project would repair and stabilize eroding channel banks at ten locations along the creek through either the installation of rock riprap to reconstruct the bank or sheet pile walls. By doing this, this project will help:
- Minimize future bank failure and potential damage to nearby properties.
- Minimize impacts on water quality and riparian habitat associated with continued bank erosion.
- Reduce the need for on-going maintenance.
- Maintain the existing level of flood protection.
This portion of Calabazas Creek features steep banks and several areas with minimal distance between the top of the bank and residential fence lines, which makes it vulnerable to bank erosion issues. In 2011, Valley Water completed construction on the Calabazas Creek Flood Protection Project along a 3.7 mile stretch of Calabazas Creek between Miller Avenue in Cupertino and Wardell Road in Saratoga. As part of that work, Valley Water repaired bank erosion along several sections of the creek that are also located within the current bank rehabilitation project area.
During recent inspections, Valley Water observed erosion, signs of bank failure and surfaces lacking cover from vegetation. Many of these issues were a result of the winter storms that occurred in late 2016 and early 2017. This project will fix these identified issues and their surrounding areas, which may include sites that overlap with the erosion repair sections previously identified in 2011.
