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The recently completed Skowhegan whitewater park feasibility study, completed by Kleinshmidt Associates of Pittsfield, is well done. The document takes a serious preliminary look at the proposed park in the Kennebec Gorge in downtown Skowhegan and concludes the project is feasible. Itoutlines the next steps needed for a whitewater park to happen, including permits, design, funding and possible user conflicts.
It identifies the following positives about the proposed whitewater park in the Skowhegan Gorge below the foot bridge:
-Sufficient flow and head to maintain conditions for the summer
-Adequate staging and takeout
-Regulated flows from Weston Dam to allow for some level of consistency of river features
-Varying levels of reasonably predictable whitewater features, which could provide a range of boating activities
Challenges recognized include:
-The large size of and limited access to the Gorge will make construction logistics challenging
-Continuous high velocity flow and seasonal extremes will requires features of significant size to provide the adequate water displacement necessary for viable whitewater features that withstand long-term use.
-Unknown subsurface/bathymetric conditions
After reading the study, I offer a few points to consider (in layman’s terms). Not in the study itself, but in the several mainstream media articles found in Appendix B, the word “kayak” seemed to be used to cover any boat paddled with a double-bladed paddle...
A sea kayak (or “rec kayak” or “touring kayak”) is a road bike.
A whitewater kayak (or “playboat”) is a mountain bike.
A raft is an SUV.
Almost everybody can ride a road bike … a sea kayak. It is stable, meant for traveling on water with little or no current and is suitable for paddlers of any skill level.
A whitewater kayak, the mountain bike, is more aggressive and is meant for navigating rivers with substantial current. It is much shorter than a sea kayak and is suitable for paddlers who have developed an understanding of rivers. Sea kayakers are into long paddles with great views. While whitewater kayakers will not ignore pretty scenery, they are in their boats looking for adrenaline and physical progress.
A raft is an SUV. These inflatable crafts can carry many people and much gear. Measuring sometimes 7 feet wide, rafts specialize on longer trips in wide rivers.
A canoe is a canoe, and people go some amazing places in them.
These are all completely different sports.
The only one of the three that a whitewater park would serve is whitewater kayaking. Some canoeists will also surely give it a try.
This is because sea kayaking and rafting generally require more than 1,100 feet of water (the proposed length of the Skowhegan whitewater park) to make the trip worthwhile.
It should also be pointed out that within whitewater kayaking, there are several different disciplines: creek boating (navigation of narrow, low volume streams/creeks in higher-volume kayaks), squirt boating (using flat, fiberglass kayaks that specialize in getting vertical in eddylines [“squirting”]), playboating or freestyle (surfing on a wave or in a hole and performing stationary moves, like a gymnast or a skateboarder) and then there is simply river running (getting in your kayak and padding downstream).
Whitewater kayaking requires the paddler to have a “roll.” This is the stroke used when the kayak is flipped upside down and the kayaker needs to breathe. If you cannot roll, you are “a beginner.”
It should be noted, most people who own sea kayaks, do not know how to roll, which might not make them “beginners” in their sport.
“Park and play” refers to a river feature (a wave or hole) that is situated in close proximity to a parking lot, and is also appealing enough for whitewater boaters to want to try it again and again.
A key element for a Park and play spot’s success, not discussed in the feasibility study, is the concept of “eddy service.” Eddy service is when a paddler can paddle from an eddy onto a feature, surf for a little bit, paddle off the feature, re-catch the eddy, paddle back up to the top of the eddy and get back on the feature. For hours. Eddy service features are great because they supercede the need to walk/drive back upstream should the paddler want to take another try on the feature.
If the Skowhegan whitewater park was an eddy serviced Park and play, it would get use by whitewater kayakers every day of the summer.
On any given Saturday in the summer, there are between 50 and 200 whitewater kayakers paddling the Kennebec Gorge. It’s a safe bet that most of these southbound boaters would visit the Skowhegan whitewater park on their way home.
I personally know over 100 Maine kayakers who would paddle at a whitewater park in Skowhegan at least 20 days/summer. Also, consider the fact that this publication regularly retrieves just 900 of the 8,000 copies we distribute. That’s 7,100 people every two weeks who are at least interested enough in whitewater to read a magazine with a kayaker on the cover.
That brings up another huge positive for the whitewater park: refining kids’ vital whitewater skills in a safe environment. After the completion of the whitewater park, kids can learn in afternoon sessions at summer camps with expert instruction. Then they can take those skills out to all the other great rivers and creeks in Maine.
And let’s get serious, nothing against slalom racing, but how many 16 year olds in Maine are dreaming of being a canoe slalom racer in the Olympics? Whitewater kayaking is a sport on the move, because it is independent, fun, aesthetically beautiful, highly addictive, physically envigorating, and it’s something you do with friends.
Another thing I noticed in the feasibility study was repeated references to a “slalom course.” If it’s possible to build a play feature in the middle of a slalom course, I say go for it; but priority should definitely be placed on creating an excellent Park and play feature.
How many active slalom competitors are there in Skowhegan? (At the 2000 Open Canoe Slalom Nationals held on the Dead River in The Forks, there were just 78 competitors, according to the American Canoe Association). Nothing against slalom, but there’s just more interest in whitewater kayaking. Plus, with a Park and play feature, there is far less logistics with no gates to maintain, no shuttle to set up.
In the most recent issue of Kayak, there are three articles about the explosion of whitewater parks in the country. One rant in particular piqued my interest. It was written by Mike Harvey, a man who designs whitewater parks for a living.
He writes: “The two biggest paddling events this [freestyle kayak] season took place in whitewater parks in Reno, Nev. and Vail, Colo. The events are growing because sponsors don’t mind doling out big bucks to events that expose people to the sport who would not have been otherwise.” At the event in Reno, 13,000 spectators saw some part of the competition over the weekend.
Not to mention the fact a whitewater park creates a safe environment to learn the sport of whitewater kayaking, thereby bringing new people into the sport.
In addition, with regular 3,000+ cubic feet per second flows, freestyle events could be held at a feature in the park which would bring paddlers from all over the northeast. Given the proximity to the fine paddling on the Dead and Kennebec Gorge, these paddlers from away would surely make a weekend (or more) of it.
Harvey also writes, “The first whitewater park built in the United States, strictly for recreation (not as a competition venue for slalom or safe passage through a dam) was in Golden, Colo. in 1996… And in the last three years nearly every Colorado community with a suitable river has built a park or is in the planning stages.”
In the west, the culture of whitewater is thriving.
In Maine, your average citizen thinks a whitewater kayak, a surfboard, a sea kayak and a raft are the same animal.
To that end, I would like to invite members of the Run-of-river Project on a rafting trip on the Kennebec Gorge.
Not only is this experience worth doing for sheer enjoyment; but it would help planners appreciate the culture the whitewater park would be attempting to enter. We could stop at some of the natural play spots on the Kennebec and watch kayakers doing their thing.
This knowledge would help avoid embarrassing articles like the one that appeared in the Bangor Daily News on June 25 (“White-water rafting could boost Skowhegan coffer”). The well-meaning writer, Sharon Kiley Mack, called the project a “white-water rafting course” and also wrote “The structures would allow for an Olympic quality course, with a slalom course on one side. The center of the river would remain relatively flat.”
The writer did not quote of the Run-of-river staff when calling the project a “white-water rafting course” nor in any of her three “Olympic” references; but, nonetheless experienced paddlers who stumbled across the article must have all snickered, while the article effectively widened the gap between paddlers and non-paddlers.
The distinction between whitewater kayaks, sea kayaks, and rafts must be recognized before this project progresses too much further. Otherwise, a lot of money may be spent to build something that is not useful to anyone.
This project is still a long way off: Kleinshmidt outlines the path as follows: securing funding for a more detailed study (which would include an economic development study, preliminary design, a computer model and resolving town issues), then complete that study, then secure the construction funding, then complete the final design and develop the physical model, then develop the bid specifications, then select the contractor, then build the whitewater park. The engineering firm guesses the park would cost $1.5 million at the most.
If this project is going to happen, whitewater paddlers need to let the town of Skowhegan know that they support and would use the whitewater park.
Email nick [at] noumbrella [dot] com with your questions, comments and concerns.
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