Waterbodies in our region face a variety of issues impacting the quality of the water, as well as the health of the living things that depend on it. Wisconsin DNR, through a mandate from section 303(d) of the Clean Water Act, updates a list of impaired waters in the state every two years as a way of tracking the progression or deterioration of our water quality.
Stormwater runoff from both agriculture and increasing urbanization are primary sources of pollutants entering streams, rivers, and lakes; however, there are many other factors impacting our water quality and quantity as well.
Chloride
Learn how chloride from road salt and water softeners reaches water resources and regional initiatives to reduce future chloride increases.
Other Issues
The following maps will walk you through the specific surface water issues facing some of our impaired waterbodies in the Greater Madison Region. Use the tabs at the top to learn about different stressors effecting our streams, rivers, and lakes and to learn what you can do to help.
Learn More
Water Quality Maps
Interactive maps allow access to up-to-date information on water quality. Visit these sites to learn more about available data for specific water bodies.
Land and Water Resources Viewer
An interactive county map showing watershed boundaries, thermally sensitive areas, cold water communities and more.
Water Condition Viewer
Includes biotic indices, assessments and management data, and locations of TMDL and Nine Key Element plans.
Wisconsin Water Quantity Data Viewer
Quantity data collected by WDNR, the USGS, and the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey. Includes well applications and approvals, high capacity withdrawal locations, groundwater protection features, and springs.
Water Quality Documents
This report inventoried existing wetlands in Dane County.
This report put wetlands in the context of surrounding uplands and watersheds to highlight unique qualities of each wetland. It summarizes wetland ecosystems and ecological concepts and developed plant community maps for individual wetlands.
Environmental corridors are designated to protect resources that provide important environmental functions, such as streams, wetlands, floodplains, and steep slopes bordering water bodies.
Environmental corridors are continuous systems of open space in urban and urbanizing areas. These corridors include environmentally sensitive lands, natural resources requiring protection from disturbance and development, and lands needed for open space and recreational use. Corridor delineation is based mainly on drainage ways and stream channels, floodplains, wetlands, steep slopes, and other natural features.
This guide is intended to support and encourage landowner and community-based wetland improvement project.
The information, strategies, and activities provide the overall framework and various options for land acquisition, conservation easements, cooperative agreements, and management projects by individuals and groups in the community. Everyone brings their own set of skills, resources, and support base. The guide is meant to reflect how you or your organization can participate and cooperate in the efforts needed to reverse the loss of wetlands in Dane County, promote water quality improvements in its surface waters, and reduce damages and costs associated with flooding, erosion, and loss of habitat and wildlife.
This in-depth analysis of urban nonpoint source pollution issues and management practices in our region includes references for best management practices (BMPs).
This report summarizes relevant existing federal, state, and local regulations, available models, and current monitoring of urban nonpoint source pollution in the region. Management considerations and recommendations are also discussed.
- CARPC should collaborate with management agencies to develop watershed level plans that assess the resources in the watershed, identify the range of potential opportunities for protecting and enhancing the resources, and set goals for improvement. Priority should be given to sensitive (i.e., Badger Mill Creek, Black Earth Creek, Token Creek and Sugar River) watersheds and/or currently impaired watersheds
- Management agencies should encourage stormwater management systems that emphasize low impact development and green infrastructure
- Management agencies should continue to cooperate in sponsoring field tests of the feasibility and effectiveness of innovative stormwater management ideas and technologies
- Management agencies should continue to evaluate and promote potential approaches for improving sediment and phosphorus removal in the design, operation, and maintenance of stormwater management systems
- Management agencies should continue to encourage stormwater management systems that minimize the potential for nutrients or toxic materials being washed or discharged into surface waters, with an emphasis on source control
- Municipalities should continue to conduct street sweeping with regenerative-air or vacuum-assist sweepers for the control of litter and floatables, particularly in early spring and late autumn
- Management agencies should continue to conduct public education and information programs regarding pollution prevention and source control on an annual basis
- Management agencies should collaboratively prepare a chloride management plan for the region which continues to expand efforts to reduce ground and surface water impacts associated with salt use, including identifying alternative materials and approaches
- Dane County and all municipalities should adopt the climate change adaption recommendations of the WICCI Stormwater Working Group, particularly they should update their stormwater ordinances to incorporate more current official rainfall data as it becomes available. CARPC should collaborate with other management agencies to prepare a technical paper to examine the issue of climate change as it relates to our region
- Dane County and all municipalities should update their stormwater ordinances to include at a minimum, a performance standard of maintaining pre-development peak runoff rates for the 1-, 2-, 10-, and 100-year 24-hours design storms
- Dane County and all municipalities should update their stormwater ordinances to include at a minimum, a performance standard of maintaining 90% of the pre-development stay-on volume on an average annual basis for all land uses
- Dane County and all municipalities should update their stormwater ordinances to include a performance standard of maintaining pre-development groundwater recharge rates based on the rates in the Wisconsin Geological and Natural History Survey’s 2009 report, Groundwater Recharge in Dane County, Wisconsin, Estimated by a GIS Based Water-Balance Model or future updates, or by a site specific analysis
- Management agencies should put into practice adaptive management strategies that include monitoring of the resources, monitoring of the maintenance and performance of the BMPs, and implementation of corrective actions as needed
- CARPC should collaborate with the Dane County Lakes and Watershed Commission to undertake a legal and institutional analysis of workable approaches to BMP monitoring and enforcement
- CARPC should collaborate with other management agencies to ensure that these research needs identified by the Commission’s Technical Advisory Committee, for the future evaluation of the volume control issue, are carried out in a timely manner
- Management agencies should continue to promote inter-agency review to streamline permitting while ensuring protection of the natural resources
- Urban management agencies should enact and enforce leaf, yard, and garden debris storage and disposal ordinances in urban areas, including leaf pick-up in the fall, with emphasis on keeping leaves and yard waste off of streets and paved surfaces
- Urban management agencies should include provisions in building codes and ordinances to require that, wherever feasible, drainage from roofs, driveways, and parking lots be directed toward grassed or vegetated areas, rather than paved areas or storm sewers
- Designated municipalities should implement the state NR 216, NR 151, and federal Phase II stormwater regulations along with the existing Erosion Control and Stormwater Management Ordinance. Other municipalities should consider developing consistent programs, ordinances, and requirements
- A coordinated stormwater management plan should be developed for all communities in the municipal NR 216 stormwater permit area
- Management agencies should apply for grant funding to develop stormwater management plans and install best management practices that control urban stormwater impacts
A CARPC report covering Surface Water Quality Conditions in Dane County.
Historically, pollution control has focused on point sources. Targeting individual discharges (e.g. from waste water treatment plants, factories, etc.) through permits has effectively reduced those pollutants from reaching surface waters and thus improved surface water quality. The largest issues impacting surface water quality now relate to nonpoint sources - impacts of disperse land use and land management practices. Water bodies are also influenced by changes to water levels and flow (hydrologic regimes). Increased runoff from impervious surfaces negatively impacts waterbodies. Reducing runoff volume would help address both quantity and quality issues since high flows also carry large amount of pollutants.
Water resource monitoring conducted over the last three decades illustrates a few important stream, lake, and groundwater quality findings as the basis for future actions and work in the region:
- Despite the significant growth and development over the last three decades, in general, surface water quality in streams is not declining and is actually improving for various parameters and in many locations due to wastewater treatment plant upgrades and other point source pollution controls. More recent improvements in some areas have also resulted from improved land management and conservation practices. While much has been accomplished in this regard, more work is needed.
- Over-fertilization and sedimentation of our lakes and streams from rural and urban nonpoint source stormwater runoff continues to be a problem. These impacts are more difficult to measure and remedy since they cannot usually be traced to a single point or origin. Priority Watershed Projects, local stormwater management ordinances and plans, and agricultural conservation practices are being pursued which implement strategies for reducing runoff and pollution from these varied sources. The Rock River TMDL and associated nutrient trading opportunities are good examples of the innovative and cost-effective measures
being developed for addressing this problem. This collaborative approach should be considered as a model in other parts of the region as well – to help prevent impairment of waters as well as improve conditions where opportunities permit. - Groundwater indicates worsening trends, especially increasing nitrates from overuse of fertilizers and increasing salt concentrations evident in stream baseflow and municipal wells. More attention needs to be directed at reducing the amount of these materials being applied to the land surface. The effect of municipal well water withdrawals on water table levels and stream baseflows is also a growing concern. More efforts are needed to minimize water use along with innovative measures to direct more precipitation into the ground to help make up for these withdrawals – such as enhanced infiltration through engineered soils, rain gardens, and bioretention facilities; along with water supply planning to evaluate and avoid/ minimize wells withdrawals in sensitive areas.
- The current monitoring program should be continued and also expanded. While certain water resource information problems and improvements have been revealed through monitoring activities, much is still unknown due to limited resource information. A more systematic and tiered approach is needed to assess water resource conditions throughout the region following the WDNR’s Wisconsin Consolidated Assessment Listing Methodology. Continued identification of problems, trends, and success stories through monitoring activities will help provide the necessary information and impetus for directing more efficient and cost-effective resource management plans, projects, and strategies to where they are needed most.
Point Source Inventory and Analysis (2017)
The Point Source Inventory for Dane County lists all regulated wastewater discharges to ground and surface water.
These points sources include municipal wastewater treatment plants and industrial discharges. Specific effluent limits, information on receiving water, treatment process, performance, problem assessment, and recommendations were developed for each municipal wastewater treatment plant. Industrial discharges must treat their own waste and do not send their water to a wastewater treatment plant. Specific operation, effluent limits, and recommendations for each discharge are noted. The report presents a summary of findings and recommendations, as well as, discussion of several areas needing continuing efforts: phosphorus, chlorides, “one water”, and regionalization.