Embedded Files
FLOW has been working on Potters Creek in the Perry Park area (starting at Snouffer) since 2019, starting with an Earth Day seedling planting event with Battelle River and Streams. Two pollinator gardens were added to Perry Park in 2019. A grant enabled us to replant the lower portion of the stream corridor to support the insect and birds.
STREAM QUALITY MONITORING RESULTS
2021 monitoring data for Potters Creek (Macroinvertebrate Cumulative Index Value rating: poor)
What is the real name of this stream?
According to the Ohio EPA River Mile Index this stream was previously called the Unnamed Trib to the Olentangy at River Mile 10.15 as shown in a 1968 topo map. The map does not show the stream going all the way to Snouffer Rd. but the topography indicates it could.
Accoring to Jeff Pierce of FSWCD, the tributary that Worthington calls Potters Creek is marked as Linworth Run on the Franklin County Road Map and Street Locator and was listed as Linworth Run in the original hydrography dataset from the Franklin County Auditor’s Office in 1995. The tributary is not officially named Linworth Run in the US Board on Geographic Names database.
The USGS National Hydrography Database also shows the tributary listed as Linworth Run turning to the west and stopping at the railroad tracks south of Perry Park. The tributary that comes down through Perry Park has a county ditch petition history dating back to 1889 as the Smoky Row Ditch (the petitions also included a portion of what is now called Linworth Run down to the crossing at Linworth Road). See the photo to the right, showing the USGS NHD line (teal) branching to the west and to the railroad tracks. Everything above that branch is in the dataset as Smoky Row Ditch for the main tributary and Smoky Row Ditch watershed for the unnamed tributaries.
History: the Village of Elwood became Linworth at some point between 1910 and 1950, and both the Carhart Ditch and Linworth Run are very close to Linworth. A landowner named Ruth Potter also shows up as owning 61.31 acres south of Perry Park and west of Linworth Road that was turned into housing at some point in the past. Worthington may be using a local variant taken from the Potter family name, but the tributary is officially marked as Linworth Run on the County Engineer’s Road Map and in the Franklin County Auditor’s GIS system. The name Potters Creek does not appear in data from the late 1990s, so it may be a more recent local variant.
1968 topographical map, where the stream is "Unnamed Trib" at RM 10.15
USGS National Hydrography Database shows the western section of the tributary (teal) stopping at the tracks, with the section going north through Perry Park (magenta) was called Smoky Row Ditch.
A closeup of Perry Park, Potters Creek, Worthington, 2300 Collins Dr.
Potters Creek head cut downstream of pedestrian bridge
Potters Creek Downstream of Perry Park
Potters Creek near Perry Ave.
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