Make Crooked the Straight

You see it in spots all over the country. Rivers and streams that had been straightened in the name of flood control, or agriculture or navigation. It's the old, "it seemed like a good idea at the time". The latest example is in Utah, where The Nature Conservancy is working to put the bends back into Kays Creek, which flows into the Great Salt Lake.
"After [the creek] was put into a straight channel, it destroyed the bird habitat and created flooding for the farmers upstream and, basically, made a nightmare for the Davis County Mosquito Abatement District," said Chris Brown, project manager for the Nature Conservancy in Utah.
With the population in surrounding communities swelling by 65 percent during the past 20 years, preservationists deem the restoration project critical to the survival of dozens of bird species that use the Great Salt Lake as rest stop in their natural migration patterns.
The nonprofit organization, which operates a 4,000-acre preserve in west Kaysville, plans to spend $345,000 to restore the final mile of Kays Creek where it feeds into the lake. The group is seeking funding from the state's LeRay McAllister Critical Land Conservation Fund along with donations from organizations such as Ducks Unlimited to pay for the project.
"This is the first time at our Great Salt Lake Shorelands Preserve where the Nature Conservancy has gone beyond protecting habitat to actually trying to return it to its historic and natural state," Amanda Smith, the group's government-relations specialist, told the Davis County Commission, which passed a resolution Tuesday supporting the project.
Sometimes the best way from one place to another isn't necessarily a straight line.