Improving Dallas,
Creek by Creek

Large free lot on the north side of Ledbetter. Secondary parking on E. Pentagon Parkway. On-site restrooms and pavilion.

The 1.4-mile Glendale Loop Trail crosses Five Mile Creek twice inside the armpit of the I-35E/Loop 12/Ledbetter interchange — one of South Dallas's densest QSR and strip-center clusters. Creek bed falls to Dallas Water Utilities, trail to Parks, Ledbetter to Streets, the I-35E deck drains to TxDOT, and upstream apartments are private — nobody owns the riparian band where their trash piles up. Trust for Public Land's recent work on Alice Branch just upstream removed 34 tons including tires and drug debris.

Styrofoam and plastic QSR packaging (McDonald's and Whataburger dominant), plastic grocery bags snagged in creekside brush, glass bottles, aluminum cans, tires (chronic in this watershed), auto-parts fragments off the I-35E shoulder, and wind-blown shopping-cart debris.

Stage at the Glendale Park lot, run the 1.4-mile loop plus both creek banks (~2 miles effective pick-line). Focus on three hotspots: the I-35E underpass, the creek edge behind the Flats at Five Mile Creek apartments, and the Ledbetter bridge outfall. 5–6 crew, 3–4 hours.

Water moccasins documented in Five Mile Creek — snake gaiters mandatory. Possible encampment under the I-35E deck, do not approach. Sharps risk reported on Alice Branch upstream. Ledbetter is a six-lane arterial — stay 10 feet from pavement. Flash-flood risk — cancel if rain forecast ≥40%. Schedule October–April or 6–10 AM May–September.

Five Mile Creek watershed houses ~200,000 residents, 90%+ Black and Hispanic, with only 54% having a park within a 10-minute walk versus 73% citywide. Cleanup directly advances the $78M Five Mile Creek Greenbelt equity initiative led by Trust for Public Land.

East off SH 310/S. Central Expressway past the WW Roland Trucking sign. Only trailhead on the Trinity Forest Trail with working restrooms. Secondary: Eco Park Trailhead on west Simpson Stuart Road.

The "commercial anchor" here is heavy industry — Texas Star Ready Mix, Austin Bridge & Road, TAMKO shingle plant, a Union Pacific rail yard. Joppa Preserve is dual-jurisdiction — Dallas Park & Rec plus Dallas County Open Spaces — with USACE holding part of the floodplain and TCEQ/EPA owning water and air. Residents have documented months-long delays on basic maintenance. Textbook jurisdictional orphan.

Privet-trapped plastic bags and Styrofoam along the Lemmon Lake mudflats, tires dumped from industrial trucks, shingle fragments and aggregate washed from TAMKO and the batch plants, wind-blown QSR packaging from MLK/Lamar, fishing line around West Pond, and occasional abandoned vehicles on dirt spurs.

Start at River Oaks Park trailhead, run ~0.75 mile north along the Trinity Forest Trail to the metal bridge and Loop 12 underpass, work both trail edges and the Lemmon/West Pond shoreline, return via the same corridor. 5–6 crew, 3.5–5 hours.

Most hazardous site of the five. Feral hogs documented in Great Trinity Forest — travel in groups, make noise. Copperheads and cottonmouths in bottomland. Industrial PM2.5 runs in the 77th–84th percentile nationally — schedule weekend mornings when batch plants are idle. Shingle fragments pose a lung hazard — N95 masks plus puncture-resistant gloves required. Daytime only in groups of three or more.

Joppa was founded in 1872 by formerly enslaved people and holds roughly 500–1,000 residents today, predominantly Black and Hispanic. "Per capita, no other Dallas neighborhood suffers from a higher pollution burden" (Robert Wood Johnson Foundation). The adjacent Trinity River Audubon Center sits on the former Deepwood illegal dump — once the largest in Texas history.

Free surface lot. Secondary: ArtPark Trinity Groves, 331 Singleton Blvd. Backup: Trammell Crow Park, 3700 Sylvan Avenue.

The paved Trinity Skyline Trail runs inside the Dallas Floodway with the Trinity Groves restaurant row directly on the bluff above. Five jurisdictions split the corridor: USACE Fort Worth District (levee), Dallas Water Utilities (floodway), Parks (paved surface), Streets (Singleton curb), and private retail. The 10–30 foot riparian band between trail edge and pilot channel is a classic orphan zone.

Single-use cups, straws, and to-go clamshells from Trinity Groves; beer and hard-seltzer cans from the bridge nightlife; Styrofoam from Singleton Blvd QSR; plastic bags caught in riparian brush; convenience-store litter; tires and construction debris from upstream; and encampment-adjacent tarps/clothing near bridge bases.

Stage at Lozada Gateway, walk west on the Skyline Trail toward Sylvan Avenue focusing on the riparian strip, turn at Trammell Crow Park for an out-and-back. ~1 mile of trail edge both sides = ~2 linear miles of pick-line. 5–6 crew, 3.5–4.5 hours.

Persistent encampment activity under I-35E, Continental, and Commerce Street bridges — stay west of all bridges, coordinate with Dallas Office of Homeless Solutions before scheduling. Flash flood is the dominant hazard — USACE upstream releases can raise the pilot channel several feet. Check the Commerce Street gauge and never work within 48 hours of rain. Cottonmouths and copperheads in riparian brush. Hi-vis vests essential.

From 1934–1984, the RSR Corporation lead smelter two miles west released roughly 269 tons of lead per year; battery casings were used as fill in Black and Mexican-American yards and driveways across West Dallas. EPA remediated 400+ properties. Cleaning this riparian strip continues a 90-year community fight for environmental justice.

Same staging point Friends of Bachman Lake uses for monthly plogging events. Secondary lot on Northwest Highway between Lemmon and Webb Chapel Extension.

This site has the single clearest operational partnership in the portfolio — Friends of Bachman Lake publicly states the Parks Department has not funded maintenance cleanups. They run monthly first-Saturday cleanups and openly solicit Adopt-a-Shoreline partners. Harry Hines, Northwest Highway, and Lemmon Avenue all storm-drain into Bachman Branch, conveying debris directly to 132-acre Bachman Lake. A January 2024 cleanup filled three shopping carts in a single pass.

Shopping carts and cart parts, plastic bottles, aluminum cans, QSR wrappers, Styrofoam, diapers and baby wipes (surrounding census tracts have among the highest concentrations of children under three in Dallas), mattresses and furniture, tires rolling off Northwest Highway, and privet cuttings from ongoing invasive-plant restoration.

Stage at the Rowing Club lot, cross Shorecrest into the Bachman Greenbelt trails east of Lemmon, work the south-shore creek-edge trails where trash concentrates between the mulched path and the shoreline, close the loop along the paved lake trail. ~1.0–1.5 miles of trail, 2–3 miles of pick-line. 4–6 crew, 3–4 hours.

Constant Love Field jet noise and intermittent fuel odor (not a short-exposure hazard but flag it). Lower encampment density than Trinity floodway but still present. Water snakes and occasional copperhead in creek brush. Bring rubber-boot option for creek-edge work. Confirm Bachman Dam construction status before scheduling.

Surrounding census tracts are predominantly foreign-born Spanish-speaking families. The redlining-driven channeling of Latino residents into the flood-prone Bachman Branch corridor was compounded by the Northwest Transfer Station, Love Field expansion, and Harry Hines medical-industrial cluster. Upstream intervention with downstream benefit — Bachman Creek flows to the Trinity.

City of Garland's official Duck Creek Cleanup staging site. Secondary: Cody Park on I-30 frontage. Commercial-adjacent staging at Walmart Supercenter, 555 W. Interstate 30.

The paved Duck Creek Trail threads directly between a Walmart Supercenter parking lot, an I-30 frontage QSR cluster (Whataburger, McDonald's, Taco Bell), and the Duck Creek channel — textbook three-way jurisdictional gap between TxDOT (I-30 ROW), Walmart (private), and Garland Parks (trail surface). The city's own "Get the Yuck out of Duck Creek" cleanup targets six sites along this corridor, confirming chronic accumulation.

QSR wrappers and cups blown off I-30, Walmart shopping bags in creek brush, single-use bottles and cans, Styrofoam, full shopping carts in the creek, mattresses and tires, cigarette butts concentrated at lot edges, and stormwater plastic film on the banks.

Stage at Audubon Park, run south on the greenbelt toward Greenbelt Parkway and the I-30 frontage, loop around the Walmart back-lot section, return via the east creek bank. ~1.5–2 miles of corridor. 5–6 crew, 3.5–4 hours.

Documented homeless encampments along the corridor — coordinate with Garland PD's WeCan homeless liaison and keep crews in the more developed Audubon–Cody Park segment. Copperheads likely in creek bottomland. Closed-toe shoes mandated by city. Flash flood cancels work. Hi-vis vests at I-30 frontage and Broadway crossings.

Garland is 45.7% Hispanic, 15.1% Black, and ~9% Asian, with one of the largest Vietnamese communities in DFW anchored by Cali Saigon Mall. ZIP 75043 is among Garland's more economically stressed areas. The Duck Creek Greenbelt is one of the few accessible green amenities for Porter Elementary families and apartment residents walking to the Walmart/retail cluster.