After years of proposals and setbacks, the dream to return Grand Rapids’ namesake to the Grand River officially kicked off this summer and has been making good progress. Construction crews, including a backhoe, have been progressively removing the dam under the water to return the river to its natural state that generations of people have known it for.
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But for many of us who have known nothing but a time when the Grand River was rapidless, there’s a question of what exactly crews are removing and putting down to the riverbed.
So, I did some digging through the Grand Rapids City Archives to find these dams that have had such a fundamental change on the river’s behavior.
Grand Rapids WhiteWater & The Grand River Dams
These dams are an interesting example of how times change. Around 100 years ago, the four dams set to be removed by Grand Rapids WhiteWater were originally installedas a beautification project to keep the river levels the same year-round, mitigating the rapids as a result…