Upper Monongahela River Association
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The purpose of the Upper Monongahela River Association (UMRA) is to promote the general development of the Upper Monongahela River, primarily in West Virginia.
Click here for a more detailed statement of our purpose.
Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling and its Impact on the Monongahela
Few people would ever guess that drilling for natural gas could significantly affect the movement of river barges, but recent events suggest otherwise. We are adding information regarding this new challange on a special webpage
Impact of Marcellus Shale Gas Drilling on Monongahela River
Attention All Boaters
For 34 years the federal Environmental Protection Agency (EPA) exempted discharges from recreational boats from the Clean Water Act permit system. A recent ruling in a California court cancelled this permit exemption. EPA was then required by the court decision to develop and implement by September 30, 2008 a national permit system for ALL vessels in the United States for a variety of normal operational discharges. This would have included pumping bilges and engine cooling water.
On 23 July the U.S. House and Senate approved, and on 30 July 2008 on the way home from Ohio on Air Force One, the President signed S. 2766 "The Clean Boating Act of 2008" into law. The Act permanently restores the long-standing exemption that allows recreational boats to avoid a costly permit that would otherwise be required under the Clean Water Act.
Additional information is available at www.BoatUS.com
Fourth Annual Monongahela River Summit
April 13, 2009
Waterfront Place Hotel, Morgantown, WVThe Mon River Summit is a project of the Mon River Recreation & Commerce Committee, Morgantown Area Chamber of Commerce. Reports on the Summit can be found on our News page. As time permits, extended descriptions of the sessions will be posted at www.monriversummit.org
Information on other MRR&CC can also be found at www.monriversummit.org
The MRR&CC is the originator of the Upper Monongahela River Water Trail (UMWT).
Army Corps of Engineers Sets 2008 Summer Hours for Area Dams
Army Corps Expands Lock Hours for Boaters, but Upper Monongahela & Upper Allegheny River lock hours remain restricted.
UMRA thanks the staff Pittsburgh District, and Colonel Mike Crall and Rich Lockwood, Chief, Operations Division, in particular, for their "customer oriented" approach to lock hours scheduling. Despite continuing shortages in funding for operations, they have again increased the usability of lock hours for recreational boaters.
For the convenience of cruising boaters, Friday and Monday windows are included, making it possible for slower boats to reach Fairmont and return during the same week.
For fishing, an early schedule is used during the spring.
Click here for a copy of Nav08-04, the Monongahela River lock hours.
Click here for a copy of Nav08-05, the Allegheny River lock hours.
We would like to call your attention to a statement in the Corps announcement:
"Under unusual circumstances, appointment lockages will be authorized for groups of recreational boaters or individual boaters, if an emergency situation warrants."
The official notices regarding navigation in the Pittsburgh District can be found at
Please Support Our Interim Solution For Upper Mon Lock Hours
We are continuing our dialog with the Corps on ways in which service might be improved, even with restricted funding. Two topics under discussion are listed below.
Because the Corps' activities are virtually all governed by Congressional actions - particularly appropriations- we regularly correspond with our representatives in the House and Senate. Most of our correspondence is open for public inspection here.
Canoes, kayaks, and other small craft can portage around locks, but safety and security issues need to be resolved.
Here is our letter to Col. Hill proposing improved portages.
Upper Monongahela River Automation Study
Pittsburgh District Corps of Engineers - March 2004
(The link above connects to a scanned copy of the report on this site.)
The 2004 Energy and Water Development Appropriations Act provided $342,000 for the Corps of Engineers to examine the practicality of remote control automation devices at the Hildebrand, Morgantown, and Opekiska Locks.
This report is an interim document in response to the Appropriations Act reporting requirement.
This interim report first addresses the merits of automation of the upper Monongahela facilities, the Morgantown, Hildebrand, and Opekiska Locks and Dams, operated by the Corps of Engineers, Pittsburgh District. It is followed up with a more detailed analysis of the full practicality of automation. Efforts for this study have concentrated at this time on the capacity to successfully engineer conceptual plans/alternatives for the automation of the Morgantown, Hildebrand, and Opekiska Locks and Dams and the future requirements to implement those plans and alternatives.
The report concludes that a tremendous need and opportunity exists to automate the Upper Monongahela River. A need exists for increased operating time for recreational boaters. Remote operations are practical and operable. The process of automation could provide increased service during a period of decreasing operating funds.
Other countries have found user operation of locks to be part of the solution to staffing cost problems. See Boat Crew Operation of River Thames Locks, Wallace Venable, April 2006 (325K .PDF file) for an English approach.
