City of San Antonio cleans out river

SAN ANTONIO, Texas - The City of San Antonio is cleaning out the river. 

They do this once every two years and part of the river is drained while they do this.

San Antonio river cleaup

What they're saying:

Adrian Arroyos with the San Antonio River Authority described some of the things they found.

"Shopping carts, e-scooters, phones, wedding rings, kind of a big one, metal chairs, anything that you would see in the downtown area," he said. 

"Floatable debris, as you can see, can create a nuisance within our channels itself," said Jessica Shirley-Saenz, interim assistant director for public works for the stormwater operations division.

Crews started on Monday, Jan. 12, and the cleanup runs through Jan. 19. They're also making sure the infrastructure is in good shape. 

"It's incredibly important for one, for safety. We want to make sure we maintain all of that infrastructure and that it's sound, that we make any repairs as needed so that it functions properly whenever we need it to. Secondly, it allows us to help manage the ecological health as well," Arroyos said.

The river is drained from W. Josephine Street to South Alamo Street and includes the downtown River Loop. The trail is still open, and so are the roads.

The San Antonio River Authority is working to save native fish while the river is drained. They're also removing non-native species like giant apple snails.

They will also install 800 feet of barriers to deter apple snails.

The city is reminding people not to litter. Be careful of dropping things or things falling out of your pocket along the river.

"Once it's in the river, we do this every two years, so it's not really going to be one of those things where you can be able to easily recover pretty quickly," Shirley-Saenz said.