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Frequently Asked Questions
Fish Creek restoration brings together Anchorage history, Dena’ina place names, salmon habitat, stormwater, flooding, trails, and neighborhood connection. These questions explain what daylighting means, why Fish Creek matters, and how restoring this hidden urban creek can help create a healthier watershed for future generations.
What is Fish Creek?
Fish Creek is an urban creek in Anchorage, Alaska that flows generally east to west through Midtown, Spenard, and Turnagain before reaching the Fish Creek Estuary and Cook Inlet. Much of the creek is now hidden underground in pipes and culverts.
What is the Dena’ina name for Fish Creek?
Fish Creek is known by the Dena’ina name Ch’atanaltsegh & Łiq'aka Betnu. The name connects the creek to the deeper Indigenous history of Anchorage and to its identity as a salmon stream.
What does “daylighting” mean?
Daylighting means bringing a buried creek or stream back to the surface so it can flow in a more natural channel. For Fish Creek, daylighting means restoring sections that were placed in pipes or culverts and reconnecting them with habitat, trails, plants, and public space.
Why does Fish Creek need restoration?
Fish Creek was once a living salmon stream connected to wetlands, neighborhoods, and Dena’ina land and subsistence. Much of the creek has been buried, straightened, or routed through storm drains, which damaged habitat, worsened water quality, and disconnected Anchorage from an important urban waterway.
Where is Fish Creek now?
Fish Creek still flows through Anchorage, but much of it is hidden underground. It runs through parts of Midtown, Spenard, and Turnagain before reaching the Fish Creek Estuary and Cook Inlet.
Why is Fish Creek important to Anchorage?
Fish Creek is important because it connects Anchorage Indigenous people's history, salmon habitat, stormwater challenges. Daylighting the creek creates neighborhood green space, to motivate Midtown housing construction and deliver urban restoration opportunities in one watershed. Restoring Fish Creek will help Anchorage repair a hidden but still-living natural corridor, while encouraging new economic development.
How does restoration help with flooding?
Restoring creek corridors can help slow, absorb, and manage stormwater more naturally. Daylighting Fish Creek can reduce pressure on aging drainage infrastructure, improve water quality, and create more room for water during heavy rain and seasonal runoff.
Can salmon return to Fish Creek?
Fish Creek historically supported salmon, and restoration is a way of opening the door for fish to return. Bringing sections of the creek back to the surface, improving water quality, restoring plants and shade, and reconnecting habitat are all part of making the creek healthier and extending an open invitation to salmon, fish, and wildlife.
What has already been accomplished?
Friends of Fish Creek and community partners have been working on this vision for nearly 20 years. Progress includes community council support, feasibility studies, municipal recognition, planning work, land purchases, and growing public support for restoring Fish Creek as a green corridor through Anchorage.
How can I help restore Fish Creek?
You can help by joining the Fish Creek email list, attending public meetings, sharing project updates, volunteering as opportunities develop, donating when possible, and helping build community support for restoration.