Mississippi River Critical Area Program

Purpose

The Mississippi River Critical Area Program is a joint local and state program that provides coordinated planning and management for 72 miles of the Mississippi River, four miles of the Minnesota River, and 54,000 acres of adjacent corridor lands. The designated Mississippi River Critical Area Corridor stretches from Ramsey and Dayton, Minnesota, to the southern boundary of Dakota County on the west/south side of the river and the boundary with the Lower St. Croix National Scenic Riverway on the east/north side of the river, and runs through the heart of Minneapolis-St. Paul. To view a map of the corridor location, see Critical Area/MNRRA Corridor Map.

The Mississippi River Critical Area Program works in partnership with the Mississippi National River and Recreation Area (MNRRA) Program , a unit of the National Park Service.

In 2007, the Minnesota State Legislature directed the DNR to prepare a report on the status of the Mississippi River Corridor Critical Area (5.3 Mb). The DNR also conducted a survey of the thirty communities in the Mississippi River Critical Area Corridor to gather information on the communities' Critical Area plans and ordinances, and their experiences with the Program. A full discussion of the survey (4.7 Mb) was created as a separate report.

For more detailed information on the Critical Area Program, refer to the links in the side bar at the left, under Mississippi River Critical Area Program.