By Shannon Lukens.

 

There is a new website called YourYampaRiver.org. It has been launched by the Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District. It is a central location for water data in the Yampa River Basin to be used by water professionals to help monitor, protect, and enhance the health of the Yampa River.

 

 

Press Release from Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District; Oct. 18, 2024.

FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE

Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District Launches Yampa River Dashboard

A new website serves as a central location for water data in the Yampa River Basin.

Steamboat Springs, CO, (October 18, 2024) – On October 18, the Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District (UYWCD) introduced a new website that is home to the Yampa River Dashboard, an information hub that gathers historic, current, and forecasted watershed data specific to the Yampa River Basin from multiple sources using a curated collection of easy-to-use data tools based on user interest.

The website, found at YourYampaRiver.org, is intended for use by water professionals and the public to gain insight into water quantity and quality across the Yampa River Basin and in locations specific to users.

Users can explore data in the following four categories: watershed health, watershed management, agriculture and land, and recreation. The landing page for each of these categories contains customized tools that includes data from multiple sources, links to existing sites, and additional resources. Custom tools were developed using stakeholder input from water users that fall within the four categories to identify specific data sets most relevant to each user group.

“The Dashboard has been a great, collaborative project with input from a comprehensive group of stakeholders. The platform is user friendly to the public and allows data nerds to dive deep into the plethora of information available. We hope this tool will provide benefit to a wide audience and that it will continue to be an evolving data platform for the Basin”, says Emily Lowell, UYWCD’s District Engineer who spear-headed the project.

In 2023, UYWCD secured $95,000 in grant funding from the Yampa-White-Green Basin Roundtable to construct the Dashboard. Additional funding for the project included $10,000 from the City of Steamboat Springs and over $30,000 from UYWCD, with in-kind donations from UYWCD, Friends of the Yampa, and the Colorado Water Trust. UYWCD contracted with LRE Water to develop the Dashboard and stakeholder groups were convened over the last eighteen months to provide design feedback that ensured a user-friendly product that also helps water managers make more informed decisions.

Julie Baxter, Water Resources Manager for the City of Steamboat Springs states, “The new Yampa River Dashboard is an essential tool for the City in our ongoing efforts to monitor, protect, and enhance the health of the Yampa River. The Dashboard is also a valuable resource for community members, offering updated information on river conditions. We are very grateful to the Upper Yampa Water Conservancy District for their leadership in coordinating this effort, and to LRE for their outstanding work on the project.”

As water managers work to expand data collection and fill in data gaps to better understand the effects of changing climates, the need for a central hub for watershed data increased. Historically, even water managers were challenged with aggregating data from multiple websites and sources to identify the science impacting their watersheds.
“It’s not only difficult sometimes to navigate websites that house water data information, but for both water professionals and interested members of the community, it is often difficult to even know where to begin your search. The dashboard is a great tool for many reasons, but especially because it provides ‘one-stop shopping’ for water data on a user-friendly website”, says Jenny Frithsen, Environmental Programs Manager for Friends of the Yampa.

The custom tools found at YourYampaRiver.org are intended to simplify the process for those seeking the scientific data impacting the Basin’s waterways and watersheds. The Dashboard will serve as a free resource to all who are interested in exploring water data within the Yampa River Basin.

Completion of the dashboard was made possible by UYWCD’s key project partners: Yampa-White-Green Basin Roundtable; The City of Steamboat Springs; Friends of the Yampa; LRE Water; Colorado Water Trust; Colorado River Water Conservation District and a number of other stakeholders who provided feedback throughout the development process. The valuable input from these key stakeholders helped create the customized tools available to all on the Yampa River Dashboard, at YourYampaRiver.org.
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