Protecting Colorado's Headwaters with Kirk Klanke

In late 2022, Trout Unlimited field staff joined a collection of partners outside Granby, Colorado, to break ground on a $33 million river restoration project that has been decades in the making. Built to supply water to booming Front Range communities of Colorado in the 1980s, the Windy Gap Reservoir collects water from the Colorado River, pumps it to nearby Lake Granby, and then delivers the water to the Front Range via the Adams Tunnel underneath Rocky Mountain National Park.

Although the project has helped with the water supply demands of these growing communities, it has also done considerable damage to the river’s fish populations and water quality, leading TU to champion a solution: Build a natural stream channel around the reservoir to improve the quality of this Gold Medal trout fishery and nearly 30 miles of the Colorado River.