In the early morning, before the heat of the day, a crew from Beran Environmental Services met at the Fort Bedford Riverfront Park’s grassy riverbank. Next to it, the Raystown Branch of the Juniata River wends its way northward through Bedford Borough for 86 miles before it flows into Raystown Lake.
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The crew loaded hundreds of native Pennsylvania trees and shrubs, and thousands of plugs of wetland grasses onto the bed of their water-safe construction truck, and crossed the river.
“This is swamp white oak. That’s black chokeberry, that one there. That’s arrowwood, which is a viburnum,” said Bob Beran, president of the company, as he pointed out the species they were planting, all riparian species that thrive along the edges of waterways.
He looked around the dark colored, wet dirt to plant the last one.
“This is good spot. This bush is spice bush, and they love the shade,” he said.
Last summer, the non-profit American Rivers worked with Bedford to remove two low-head dams, basically low concrete walls that spanned the river.
“Lots of concrete; big concrete,” Beran said.
Also, “lots and lots of rebar,” said borough council member Kenny Fetterman, who spearheaded the dam removal effort.
The state built the dams in the 1970s for swimming and other recreation, Fetterman said, but they weren’t maintained properly, and the water quality behind the dam deteriorated.
The river had been stocked with trout by the state. Before the removals, Beran was inspecting the dam to engineer its removal, “there were four or five trout, and I remember they were right beside the dam just gasping for air because the water was so warm,” he said.
Kayakers reported getting stuck in the mud behind the dams, according to Fetterman. After the dams were removed, sediment and muck that had accumulated for years were exposed.
“Now, when we have a heavy rain event, it’s going to tend to take some of those concentrations of minerals and wash it downstream,” Fetterman said. “It makes the river muddy, and it’s not good for the ecology of the fish species and things like that.”
The new plantings should prevent erosion of this side of the riverbank into the water.
“All the riparian species have, they call them adventitious roots. They’ll spread across the top more; it’ll bind that whole bank together,” Beran explained.
Improvements to the park
Before the dams were removed, Fetterman said, when it rained, the water often overflowed the riverbanks and rose above the grass in the park, sometimes as high as a nearby supermarket parking lot. That made it impossible to make improvements to the park.
“Bedford was really lacking curb appeal because we’re not doing much with our park, because every time we try to get funding, it’s not available because there’s too much flooding that happens,” Fetterman said. “Anything that you install here, your investment is going to get wrecked.”
With dams gone, the river itself has narrowed, from over 200 feet wide to 60 to 70 feet. Fetterman expects that extra space in the river corridor will reduce flooding.
“It creates a situation where whenever we have heavy rain events, we have a place where that water is well contained,” he said.
Recently, after several days of rain that normally would have flooded the park, Fetterman said the water moved downstream instead, “so that is one of the things we’ve accomplished by removing the dam[s].”
Now, the borough can move forward with a riverfront revitalization plan that includes a new riverwalk, kayak rentals, pavilions and a music amphitheater.
Pennsylvania leads the nation in dam removals
“It’s beautiful,” said Lisa Hollingsworth-Segedy of the non-profit American Rivers, who coordinated the dam removals, as she admired the new riverbank plantings. “We’re kind of kickstarting the process of revegetating the river bank.”
Now more than 150 miles of streams can flow without any barriers until the river reaches Raystown Lake, she said. It’s also safer for paddling and other recreation along this section of the Juniata River Water Trail.
The dam removals improved conditions for aquatic life, including freshwater mussels, and removed barriers for fish.
“We have brook trout, we have smallmouth bass, we have stocked trout here. It’s a great fishing spot,” Hollingsworth-Segedy said.
The U.S. Fish & Wildlife Service National Fish Passage Program, with funding from the Bipartisan Infrastructure Law, provided $230,000 for the dam removals. Other aspects of the project, such as design, permitting and floodplain plantings, were funded by charitable foundations and the Bedford County Conservation District.
“As you can see, it takes a lot of fundraising from many sources to bring these projects to success,” Hollingsworth-Segedy said.
Mixed community response
Kortney Sweinhart sat on a blanket in the grass while the group of children she brought played in the river and along the banks.
“Like Lucas, you know he’s five, and he enjoys walking out there and collecting the seashells, and he’s coming up every little bit and going, ‘Mom, look at the seashells I’m finding,’” she said.
She said that when the dam was here, the water was muddier and deeper, around five feet, so the kids couldn’t play in it.
Beran Environmental surveyed the riverbed before the dams were taken down, and found deep sediment.
“We had muck up to like almost above our knees,” Beran said.
Still, the removals were upsetting to some in the Bedford community. As the dams came down, people began to see the thick, muddy riverbed for themselves, filled with debris, especially old tires.
Even Fetterman could barely believe his eyes.
“I was like ‘Oh geez, they’re just revealing themselves all over the place,” he said. “I pulled 118 tires out of this impoundment area inside the window of a week and a half while they were working on it.”
Community leaders heard complaints; Fetterman said they were often misinformed.
“We just had a lot of people coming down with some crazy ideas that what we were doing here was just going to destroy everything,” he said.
One man was concerned that the dam removals would draw mosquitoes to the area. Fetterman pointed out that the stagnant water created by the dams was more likely to attract mosquitoes. “So if there’s a problem with mosquitoes, we are going to be solving that problem,” he said.
Sweinhart also had complaints. She came here as a kid, and said they used to bring a loaf of bread to feed the ducks. She thinks that has changed.
“We’ve been here for probably about 45 minutes, and I’ve not seen one duck or anything, even in the water, so that’s hard,” she said.
But that day, the ducks were still there, just in a different part of the river.
Pennsylvania leads on dam removals
Hollingsworth-Segedy said American Rivers will continue advocating for dam removals.
Pennsylvania has more than 3,400 regulated dams statewide, according to the Department of Environmental Protection, and 75-80 percent are low-head dams like those in Bedford, according to Hollingsworth-Segedy.
One dam removal can cost up to $500,000. According to American Rivers, 100 dams were removed across the U.S. in 2025, including 14 in Pennsylvania, bringing the total to 433 removed in Pennsylvania since 1912, more than double any other state.
“We’re absolutely leading the nation,” she said. “But we’ve still got a long way to go in terms of really reconnecting enough of watersheds that we can make a real difference.”
