Once infamous as Pennsylvania’s most polluted waterway, the 110-mile Clarion River has been cleaned up and designated the state’s 2019 River of the Year.
In a joint statement Jan. 16, the Pennsylvania Organization for Waterways and Rivers, Allegheny Watershed Improvement Needs Coalition and state Department of Conservation and Natural Resources announced that in a public vote, paddlers, boaters, anglers and other outdoors users chose the Allegheny River tributary over three eastern waterways. The Clarion has attracted federal attention and is part of the National Wild and Scenic River program. The state designation opens some DCNR resources for maintenance of the waterway and is expected to focus public attention on the river and its conservation success story.
“For us the Clarion is the western gateway to the Pennsylvania Wilds, an iconic river flowing through Clear Creek and Cook Forest state parks,” said Cindy Adams Dunn, DCNR secretary. “It has a remarkable story -- the Clarion used to be too polluted for fishing and now the fishing is great, the water is clean. When I paddled it in July there were hemlock trees right down to the clean water and hundreds of people enjoying themselves, then you go around a curve and there’s no one. Solitude. You can have both experiences on the Clarion River.”
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