Highlighted by the recent decommissioning of four dams along California’s Klamath River, there’s a new era underway to remove dams across the country, restoring rivers to their natural, free-flowing states while enhancing everything from fish migration to recreation.
According to conservation group American Rivers, in the past 20 years more than 1,100 dams have been removed in the U.S.— many of them aging, unsafe structures that had outlived their usefulness. In 2020, 69 dams were removed across 23 states (led by Ohio with 11); and last year an additional 57 dams were removed, reconnecting more than 2,290 miles of rivers in 22 states, with Pennsylvania leading the charge at seven. At least 25 more are slated for removal this year.
There’s good reason for the decommissioning. Removing dams benefits river and aquatic health, public safety, climate resilience, and more. It’s better for fish migration, riparian zones, and, believe it or not, even hydropower production through better energy efficiency practices. More good news: It’s also better for paddlers, with reservoirs and concrete impediments replaced by clear-flowing waterways for recreation. Want to paddle some of these recently restored, free-flowing waterways? Below are a handful to put on your bucket list.
Penobscot River, Maine
New England’s second largest river system, Maine’s Penobscot River (including its West and South branches) flows 264 milesfrom Penobscot Lake on the Maine/Quebec border into Penobscot Bay and the Atlantic Ocean near the town of Bucksport. In 2004, the Penobscot River Restoration Trust led a public-private effort to maintain hydropower production while also restoring the river’s sea-run fisheries. It removed the Great Works Dam in 2012, the Veazie Dam in 2013, and created a bypass channel around the Howland Dam in 2016. The result: Atlantic salmon and other sea-run fish now have access to 2,000 miles of spawning habitat and populations of striped bass, alewife, blueback herring, smallmouth bass, American eel, rainbow smelt, tomcod and endangered shortnose sturgeon are booming. The removals are also better for paddlers, who can now recreate in the river’s lower section, following the wake of Henry David Thoreau, without the hazards.
One such stretch, revealing ripples and channels buried since the Industrial Revolution, is the section around the town of Old Town, home to canoe maker Old Town Canoe and the Penobscot Nation. Numerous access points allow you to paddle various lengths, with Class I-II waves replacing the now-gone dam. One flatwater fave: the 60-mile Medway to Old Town stretch, offering great smallmouth bass fishing (access via state Route 157 between Medway and Mattawamkeag, or south of Mattawamkeag via U.S. Route 2). Farther upstream, try the East Branch, from Matagamon Lake to Whetstone; or the Upper West Branch from Roll Dam to Chesuncook Village (portage or run the ledge drops at Roll Dam), with views of Mount Katahdin. For whitewater, try the West Branch, from Ripogenus Gorge to Pockwockamus Falls, for some of Maine’s best Class IV-V rapids, including Cribworks, which conservation group American Whitewater calls “the toughest regularly run rapid in New England.”
Embrey Dam, Rappahannock River, Fredericksburg, VA
With the 22-foot-high Embrey Dam on Virginia’s Rappahannock River near Fredericksburg removed in 2004, canoeists, rec kayakers, stand-up paddleboarders can now paddle through a half mile of new Class I-II rapids just north of town. Now the longest free-flowing river in the eastern U.S. and Chesapeake Bay watershed, the Rapp extends unblocked for 195 miles, from its origin at Chester Gap in the Shenandoah National Park of western Virginia to Stingray Point in the Chesapeake Bay.Paddlers can now float unimpeded from the upper Rapp to its Chesapeake mouth or enjoy multiple access points for shorter day trips. The dam’s removal has also transformed the river’s ecology, letting migratory fish like American shad and striped bass gain access to spawning grounds in the upper Rapp and its tributaries for the first time in over 150 years.
For the Fredericksburg run, put in at the boat launch on Route 618 (River Road) near Motts Run Park, which also serves as the takeout for the milder canoe run that starts 24 miles upstream at Kelly’s Ford (skip a mile of flatwater by putting in further down River Road where the road turns away from the river). Several Class I-II rapids occur in the first mile and as you pass under I-95, you enter the section that used to be flatwater that now has large boulders to navigate. The first new Class II rapid is called Hunters Mill Rapid, where water used to be diverted for a mill downstream near the dam, followed by “Carter Never Saw It,” a tribute to Randy the late local canoeing icon Randy Carter, who never had a chance to see the stretch without its dam. The dam removal also exposed an bus-sized jumping rock known affectionately as “BFR” (“Big Fat Rock”). Novices can take out just below the removed dam on river right, while more advanced paddlers can navigate Class III Falmouth Rapids just below (hint: stay with the main flow of the river), taking out on river right at Old Mill Park, just off of Fall Hill Avenue in Fredericksburg. A water trail is also being developed along the river by the Friends of the Rappahannock in cooperation with the Virginia Department of Conservation and Recreation, encompassing historical paddling trips from Kelly’s Ford to the Fredericksburg City Docks.
Elwha/Glines Canyon Dams, Elwha River, WA
For most of the twentieth century, a significant portion of Washington’s Elwha River flowed between two reservoirs. Then, in 2011, construction crews began the largest dam removal project in U.S. history: the removal of the 108-foot-tall Elwha Dam and the upper 210-foot-tall Glines Canyon Dam. The project was completed in 2014, leaving the entire 45 miles of the Elwha River, much of it in Olympic National Park, free-flowing for the first time since 1911. With the two hydroelectric dams barriers to fish populations, as well as paddlers, the New York Times called it, “one of the most promising and pure acts of environmental restoration the region and nation have ever seen.” Now the river runs free from the wilderness backcountry of the Grand Canyon of the Elwha all the way to the Juan De Fuca Strait near Port Angeles, WA.
Of note to boaters, the lower Elwha Dam covered an area that dropped 38 feet per mile, which is now open to paddling for a seven-mile run into the ocean. The put-in is on Hwy. 101 at mile 239.5 at the bridge across the river (access downstream on river right). Then get ready for a river that’s re-awakening. The first section is still developing its new river channel through the leftover sediment of the historic Aldwell Reservoir; use caution as wood hazards, including tree stumps from when the forest was cleared for the dam, are still shifting (scout from the old reservoir boat launch). After a short canyon you’ll approach the Elwha Canyon that was once blocked by Elwha Dam. Its main rapid is at the dam site, Class IV+ “That Dam Rapid”; portage it on the left, or scout on the right (and beware leftover scrap metal). Just downstream the river flows through a scenic Class II gorge and flatwater. After passing under the Highway 112 Bridge the river migrates back and forth across the floodplain until you reach the new Elwha Road Bridge, where you’ll pass the intake for the water treatment plant. (Hint: Hike the Olympic Discovery Trail if you have more time). A more braided section (still keep an eye out for wood) leads to the ocean you can end your trip with ocean surf and a new beach forming at the mouth.
Condit Dam, White Salmon River, WA
Built in 1903, the 125-foot-high Condit Dam on Washington’s White Salmon River came down in 2012, opening up the lower White Salmon to the more than 40,000 paddlers who use the upper part of the waterway every year. It was the second tallest dam to be removed in the country, and a true milestone for paddlers. “At the time, the removal of Condit was the first major dam removal on a river as popular as the White Salmon,” says American Whitewater’s Pacific Northwest Stewardship Director Thomas O’Keefe.
The new Class III+ section (with one Class V) drops 44 feet per mile and runs 5 miles down to the Columbia River. Called the White Salmon Narrows (or Bottom), it’s known for its beautiful tight-walled gorge, stunning scenery and Class V Steelhead Falls. After putting in at Northwestern Park, at mile 1.6 you’ll reach the site of the former Condit Dam, a narrow passage where you’ll find it hard to believe that a 125-foot-tall dam once existed. A mile later comes river-wide, Class V Steelhead Falls. Eddy out on river left after the river takes a 90-degree bend left and just before a 90-degree bend to the right (scout and portage on the left). From here you’ll enter the Narrows, the former Condit Powerhouse on the left and Class III Powerhouse Rapid just below. A mile of flatwater leads you to the Columbia River and your takeout on river left. Want more? Tack on the 4.3-mile, Class III-IV Middle White section just upstream, which runs from BZ Corners to Husum Falls.
Klamath River, CA
At the top of the list out West is California’s Klamath River. Between 2022-2024, four dams on the river were removed in the largest dam removal project in history. The project was completed at the end of August, after crews demolished the last of the four dams, marking a win for paddlers, environmentalists, tribal nations, salmon, and more.
With various sections of the waterway already popular among paddlers, the removals freed-up 234 miles of the river from near its source all the way to the Pacific Ocean, enhancing fish runs, riparian zones and additional paddling opportunities.
Federal regulators approved the plan to remove the four dams in 2022, with the smallest, Copco No. 2, demolished later that year, removing the remaining diversion infrastructure, grading the river channel, and performing erosion control. The work prepared the river canyon for consistent river flows, something which the river canyon below the dam hasn’t seen in 98 years.
In 2020, the Karuk and Yurok tribes, California Governor Gavin Newsom, Oregon Governor Kate Brown, the Klamath River Renewal Corporation and PacifiCorp, a subsidiary of Warren Buffett’s Berkshire Hathaway, announced a project calling for the removal of its four dams after years of effort. The dismantled dams have now opened up new paddling and fish migration possibilities in the 234-mile-long waterway that stretches from the Cascades to the Pacific, creating classic new sections of water for river runners alongside such existing sections as Class III-IV Ward’s Canyon. “Boaters can now explore a host of new day trips and string together outstanding multiday journeys,” says Northwest paddler Bill Cross. “The restored Upper Klamath is now once again one of the West’s great whitewater rivers.”
Perhaps no one is more excited than professional SUP paddler Spencer Lacy, who, in 2022, led a team down the river’s entire 234 miles, dams and all, to chronicle the river in its dammed-up state. Then they returned just last year once they were removed to float the exact same stretch, this time dam-free. “We wanted to make an environmental statement,” says Lacy. “We wanted to return and see the river corridor as it begins to return to its natural state. It was great to see the same stretch in its newfound, free-flowing glory.”
Led by Rush Sturgess, this past year the Tribal Waters Team paddled 308 miles from the headwaters of the Klamath River all the way to the Pacific Ocean. After more than four years of preparation, the 30 Indigenous youth paddlers from the Klamath Basin completed the first fully complete descent of the freshly undammed Klamath accompanied by hundreds of friends, family, boaters and river advocates from around the world along the way.
“Paddle Tribal Waters is more than just an outdoor adventure program—it’s a movement,” says Sturges, co-founder of the Paddle Tribal Waters program, which was supported by NRS. “These young people are reconnecting with their ancestral river, reclaiming their stories, and paddling toward a future rooted in cultural pride, environmental justice, and resilience. It’s been such a fun program to be a part of. We celebrate this milestone knowing the work to protect the Klamath and countless other river basins continues.”
Paddle Tribal Waters Team Touches Down in Pacific After 308 Miles Down Klamath