Taken from Prince William County Government: Resource Protection Area Requirements
Prince William County is located within the Chesapeake Bay Watershed. All of the creeks and streams in the County feed into the Potomac River and eventually the Chesapeake Bay. As part of its commitment to protecting the Bay, Prince William County adopted the Chesapeake Bay Preservation Act into its local ordinance in 1990. The Bay Act offers guidelines and requirements to protect and improve the water that flows into the Chesapeake Bay.
Vegetated areas along water bodies, such as lakes, streams, rivers, marshes or shoreline, are known as riparian buffers. Most of these buffers are included as Resource Protection Areas (RPAs) under the Bay Act. RPAs include the land area within 100 feet of a perennial stream bank or edge of wetlands adjacent to the perennial stream. RPA areas are protected under state law and local ordinances. In general, no development, land disturbance, or vegetation removal is allowed in an RPA. RPAs were designated along all perennial streams in the County. The County contacted all property owners with RPAs on their property to help them meet local requirements and play a role in protecting these important resources.
RPAs are described as the ‘last line of defense’ for the protection of water quality. These buffers stabilize shorelines and stream banks, filter pollutants, reduce volume of stormwater runoff and provide critical habitat for aquatic species and wildlife. Trees and shrubs in riparian buffers offer benefits to property owners as well by increasing property value, reducing erosion, reducing noise, improving air quality, increasing shoreline stability and providing shade in the summer and windbreaks in the winter.
Here are some RPA areas along the New Road Alternative Route
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