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INTRODUCTION The San Marcos River is the heart of the City of San Marcos. Citizens love their river with its clear, spring - fed water, riverside parks, and endangered species. Some might even say it's getting "loved to death." Recreation use is seen by some as a potential threat to the health of the river. Recreationists overwhelmingly rank their day at the river as a great experience, and the crowds there may even add to the fun of enjoying river play. The City of San Marcos Community Services Department - Parks and Recreation and Texas State University's River Systems Institute partnered with the National Park Service's Rivers, Trails and Conservation Assistance Program to study the amount and kinds of use of the river, the opinions of recreationists and citizens at large, and the impacts on the water quality and endangered species. Using the help of "experts" in various fields of recreation and resource protection, along with citizen suggestions, the partners then developed a set of recommendations that if adopted would constitute a Management Plan for River Recreation in the San Marcos River Corridor within the City Limits. The ideas for balancing recreation with resource protection were developed for the river corridor within the City Limits. ISSUES Concerns about the river were collected in several ways. In 2006, the three partners exploring river management held a community workshop attended by approximately 50 people from diverse community groups, City and University departments, landowners, resource agencies, recreationists, and others. Identified issues fell into several categories: impacts from recreation users' behavior, impacts on the river from non - recreation activities that occur within the watershed and in the riparian areas, and the needs for physical improvements. Some examples of river issues from the workshop include: • Intense use of spillway • Overcrowding • Too much hard bank stabilization • No overall interpretative plan • Need for bilingual signage and education • Lack of public information on regulations • Increasing impervious cover in watershed (and non -point source pollution) • Trash dumping in and around the river and watershed • Protection of Spring Lake buffer and aquifer recharge areas • Inappropriate plantings in the floodplain • Need comprehensive enforcement, fines, curfews • Pedestrian safety concerns. A random - sample survey of San Marcos citizens, conducted in 2008 as part of the Parks and Open Space Planning effort, asked respondents to comment on how problematic is each listed recreation issue. Their answers follow on Table A.1. 109