REGION – The Rural Rivers Project is excited to announce a new community science collaboration with the towns of Ludlow and Cavendish, Vt. Over the coming months, researchers Charis Boke, Aletha Spang, and the Rural Rivers team at Dartmouth College will collaborate with municipal officials, local partners, and community members to install new, low-cost, open-source/open-access devices to monitor water levels at key points on the Black and Ottauquechee rivers.
The Social Science, Technology, Rivers, Engineering, Arts, and Mathematics (SSTREAMnet) project has emerged out of collaborations with the Black River Action Team, Black River Good Neighbors Services in Ludlow, and Cavendish Connects. With the help of Don Blair, of Waterbear Field School, this summer, two community science fellows – Jacob Zinkerman and Jacob Lloyd – worked with the Rural Rivers Project to build the prototype water level sensor that will be installed in Ludlow in Septebmer. Partners through Mutual Aid Disaster Relief and Signals Rising provided additional devices that will be installed in Ludlow and Cavendish.
The goal of this local network of water-level sensors is to give researchers and the public – including town managers, road crews, state floodplain managers, local residents, and others – better information about changes in water levels. This will help inform work to mitigate the impacts of future floods.