TMDL Implementation Plans

Smith Creek Implementation Plan

A TMDL Implementation Plan is being developed for the Smith Creek watershed. An informational meeting for local agencies was held May 27, 2008 at the Town Hall in New Market, Virginia.

Agenda, Healthy Waters Initiative presentation, and DCR presentation from the Informational Meeting held on May 27, 2008.

This project includes the development of an implementation plan for the Smith Creek watershed for both a bacterial impairment and a benthic impairment due to sediment. Mountain Run and Fridley Run are tributaries to Smith Creek and are also listed with benthic impairments. An organic solids TMDL was developed in 2002 for another Smith Creek tributary, Lacey Spring Branch. The Smith Creek watershed is 68,000 acres in area and is located in Rockingham and Shenandoah Counties of Virginia and includes a small portion of the City of Harrisonburg. The Smith Creek watershed is part of the Shenandoah River basin. The Smith Creek watershed corresponds with the 1995 state hydrologic unit B47 and the 2006 sixth-order hydrologic units PS59-PS62. The Smith Creek watershed lies within the Interstate I-81 corridor in the Shenandoah Valley as shown in the figure below.

Location of Smith Creek Watershed


Approximately 50% of the watershed is forested with 47% in agricultural uses, and less than 4% in residential and commercial uses. Smith Creek watershed is also home to a large livestock population, estimated to include 3,900 beef cattle, 1,475 dairy cattle, and approximately equal numbers of chickens and turkeys, around 950,000 each.