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The Pickering Creek watershed covers an area of 38.8 square miles. Its headwaters begin around Lionville at its western end. To the east, just before entering the Schuylkill River below Phoenixville, it accumulates in a large public water supply reservoir maintained by the Philadelphia Suburban Water Company.
The major threat to water quality of the creek and the reservoir is sedimentation from storm water runoff. After Valley Creek, Pickering Creek is the southeastern-most watershed in Green Valleys scope, placing it very close to the metropolitan expansion of Philadelphia and adjoining Great Valley Corporate Center—the region’s “Silicon Valley.” As a result, both watersheds are encountering a tremendous amount of developmental pressure. Both ends of the Pickering Creek watershed have become highly developed with the center section filling rapidly.
The Pennsylvania Department of Environmental Protection has given the Pickering Creek a “High Quality” designation which extends special protection by the state. As a result of the efforts of Green Valleys Association, the Pickering Creek was placed on the Conservation River Registry in 1998. |
WATERSHEDS CONTINUED…
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