Peachtree Creek No Longer An Afterthought

Decatur Metro | September 21, 2009 | 2:59 pm

Medlock Park Under Peachtree Creek Flooding

David Kaufman’s excellent book, Peachtree Creek, portrayed one of the metro area’s most important watersheds as the collector of the objects and people that the city wished it could forget.  The result was a book filled with contrasting moments of both deep insight and beautiful despair.  Because it was the place that few visited or ever thought about, it could reveal more about the city in which it flowed than the Coke Museum or Margaret Mitchell House ever could.

However, record amounts have rain have suddenly put this once-forgotten creek back in the headlines.

The creek’s watershed covers much of the northeast metro area inside of I-285.  Up in Buckhead, the AJC reports of major flooding in some homes thanks to the swollen creek.  And a little closer to home, the South Fork of Peachtree Creek continues to flood Medlock Park (recent home of crawfish), just north of Decatur.  Druid Hills Youth Sports Board President James Laubenthal links to some new pics and writes in…

We are trying to get assistance from the County to try and find a fix for the on-going problem.  One of the issues is the ever-increasing vegetation and debris at the Willivee Road bridge over the creek. The debris acts as a strainer and slows down the flow, and the back up begins.

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One Response to “Peachtree Creek No Longer An Afterthought”

  1. ted elkins says:
    September 25, 2009 at 9:28 am

    S PTree creek has had crawfish forever. 25 years ago otters would come up near the bridge [medlock park/willivee] when the water was high enough, probably to snare a few crawdads. Beaver were plentiful, Fish were numerous too until an oriental family netted them 10 years ago, yes netted them.
    Homeowners along the creek cleaned up the garbage left by the public park attendees [which would wash along the creek] for years however as the county absorbed more land, that left more and more garbage. Over by the old dam, and where water/sewer pipes cross the creek, there’s usually a garbage bonanza; soccer balls, and enough styrofoam to insulate a stadium. The “bike path”, has done more to damage that once beautiful creek than 65 years of housing on the creek