The History of Everglades Restoration
- Dr. Steve Davis
- 1 hour ago
- 5 min read
November 12, 2025
Recognition of the need to resolve issues affecting the Everglades dates back to the establishment of Everglades National Park in 1938, and its dedication and opening in 1947. Then biologist, and eventually the park’s first superintendent, Dan Beard, recognized how humans had harmed the park’s resources and impacted water levels through agriculture, illegal poaching, drainage, and damming caused by Tamiami Trail’s construction in the 1920s. However, Superintendent Beard was optimistic the park could recover in its newly protected state.
Marjory Stoneman Douglas, in her 1947 book, The Everglades: River of Grass, also recognized the impacts that drainage and growing development had imposed on the Everglades, and she spoke of the need for action to preserve what remained.
Shortly after Douglas’ pivotal book and the park’s dedication, Congress authorized the Central & Southern Florida (C&SF) Project in 1948, which led to the vast system of canals, levees, and water control structures that were built by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (Army Corps) through much of the latter half of the 20th Century.
Coming at the expense of the environment, the C&SF Project was intended to provide water supply and flood protection for a growing South Florida population and expanding agriculture, especially south of Lake Okeechobee in the Everglades Agricultural Area (EAA). The C&SF Project also created hard boundaries that formalized the loss of half the original ecosystem.
Just a few years after the C&SF Project’s authorization, Dr. Bill Robertson joined Everglades National Park in 1951 as the park’s biologist, and began studying Everglades birds, as well as how fire affected the ecosystem. It didn’t take “Dr. Bill” (as he was known by friends and colleagues) long to recognize that the quality, quantity, and timing of water deliveries had been greatly altered. These attributes of water distribution were essential to protecting the Everglades’ health and its vast resources, including its iconic wading birds.
After cycles of flood and fire from an increasingly compartmentalized and disconnected Everglades, Robertson and other scientists determined that these changes threatened the long-term health of the park and remaining Everglades wetlands that existed in the state-operated Water Conservation Areas (WCAs).
Following a major drought and the most severe fire season on record, National Geographic raised the Everglades issue to a national audience. It dedicated much of the January 1972 issue to the importance of water management in South Florida and the challenges imposed by the C&SF Project on the Greater Everglades ecosystem. Around that same time, Nathaniel Reed, Assistant Secretary of the Interior under President Nixon and former advisor to Florida Governor Claude Kirk, was fighting a proposed jetport in the Everglades by pushing for the establishment of Big Cypress National Preserve. This effort was successful and inspired action to restore the remaining Everglades ecosystem.
In 1983, Florida Governor Bob Graham created the “Save the Everglades” program, which raised the issue of restoration to the level of Florida government and recognized the need for all parties to come to the table. Restoration of the Kissimmee River was unprecedented in terms of scale and scope and grew out of this Graham-led effort. Around this same time, Everglades National Park was moving ahead with a bold effort to restore the flow of water into Northeast Shark River Slough, the primary flow path for water through the park that had been cut off due to Tamiami Trail and the C&SF infrastructure.
The Modified Water Deliveries (ModWaters) project resulted in much-needed seepage control measures along the park’s eastern boundary, as well as a 1-mile bridge along Tamiami Trail. ModWaters was only made possible through the Everglades National Park Protection and Expansion Act of 1989, which was signed into law by President George H.W. Bush, resulting in the acquisition of 107,600 acres at the top of Shark River Slough.
When the late George Barley and his fishing buddy Paul Tudor Jones were alarmed by the severe decline of the water in Florida Bay in the early 1990s, the murky green water they witnessed was actually a result of seagrass die-offs that began in the late 1980s. Barley and Jones engaged scientists to understand what was happening to the water in Florida Bay. They learned that it wasn’t the Everglades killing the Bay; rather, it was a lack of freshwater from the Everglades.
Research showed that seagrass die-off, initiated by a chronic lack of freshwater inflow and ensuing hypersaline conditions, ultimately results in a lack of bottom cover, and the material – which contains nutrients – mixes into the water leading to algae blooms across the affected basins. These discoveries inspired Barley and Jones to co-found The Everglades Foundation in 1993, and to push for a massive Everglades restoration plan, with numerous projects to restore the Greater Everglades ecosystem.
Additional seepage control along the park’s southeastern boundary, made possible by the 1994 C-111 South Dade Project, as well as more bridging and road-raising along Tamiami Trail were also identified as key needs to successful completion of Everglades restoration. Likewise, following the disastrous impacts of Hurricane Katrina (2005) in New Orleans, the Army Corps recognized that the Herbert Hoover Dike surrounding Lake Okeechobee was desperately in need of repair. The reinforcement of the dike allowed for improved lake operations and increased flows to the Everglades with the implementation of Lake Okeechobee System Operating Manual (LOSOM) in 2024.
All these projects and programs, including the more than 70,000 acres of water treatment wetlands that exist along the southern rim of the EAA, fall outside of the Comprehensive Everglades Restoration Plan (CERP) that was signed into law in 2000. But they are critical foundational, non-CERP efforts that contribute to restoring the quality, quantity, timing, and distribution of water throughout the natural areas of South Florida.
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