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'''Brays Bayou''' is a [[Bayou|slow-moving river]] in [[Harris County, Texas|Harris County]], [[Texas]]. A major [[tributary]] of [[Buffalo Bayou]], the Brays flows for {{convert|31|mi|km}} from the western edge of the county, south of [[Barker Reservoir]] along the border with [[Fort Bend County, Texas|Fort Bend County]], east to its convergence with the Buffalo at [[Harrisburg, Houston|Harrisburg]].<ref name=":5">{{Cite web|url=https://www.hcfcd.org/media/1285/brays-bayou-watershed110513b.pdf|title=Brays Bayou Watershed|date=November 2013|website=Harris County Flood Control District|access-date=2017-03-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170407145609/https://www.hcfcd.org/media/1285/brays-bayou-watershed110513b.pdf|archive-date=2017-04-07|url-status=dead}}</ref> Nearly all of the river is located within the city of [[Houston]]; it is a defining geographic feature of many neighborhoods and districts, including [[Meyerland, Houston|Meyerland]], [[Braeswood Place, Houston|Braeswood Place]], the [[Texas Medical Center]], and [[Riverside Terrace, Houston|Riverside Terrace]].
As a result of its central route through Harris County, the Brays Bayou [[Drainage basin|watershed]] is heavily [[Urban area|urbanized]]. Over 700,000 people reside within its {{Convert|129|mi2|km2|adj=on}} drainage area, which contains {{Convert|124|mi|km}} of [[Open-channel flow|open-channel]] waterway, mostly from artificial drainage channels.<ref name=":5" /> This high level of development, combined with a relative lack of [[flood control]] infrastructure, means Brays Bayou is extremely prone to [[flash flood]]ing events.
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The origin of the name ''Brays Bayou'' is unclear, and the alternate spellings ''Braes'' and ''Bray's'' have been used throughout its history, most prominently in [[Braeswood Place, Houston|Braeswood Place]], a neighborhood which straddles the bayou southwest of Rice University, and Braeswood Boulevard, which runs along the river between [[Interstate 610 (Texas)|Interstate 610]] and [[Texas State Highway 288]].
''Braeswood'' may have originated from the Scottish word [[Wiktionary:brae|''brae'']], for hill or slope. An early settler along Brays Bayou, Henry MacGregor (the namesake of MacGregor Drive in the [[Third Ward, Houston|Third Ward]]), may have coined the name.<ref name=":2">{{Cite web|url=https://www.uth.edu/blog/bout-time/post.htm?id=909b5845-9fe4-4128-9416-f1be8e70f9e0|title=A bayou runs through it|last=Boutwell|first=Bryant|date=2014-12-22|website=[[University of Texas Health Science Center at Houston]]|language=en|access-date=2017-03-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170829080315/https://www.uth.edu/blog/bout-time/post.htm?id=909b5845-9fe4-4128-9416-f1be8e70f9e0|archive-date=2017-08-29|url-status=dead}}</ref>
The name ''Brays'' has been used to describe the river since the arrival of the [[Old Three Hundred]] at [[Stephen F. Austin]]'s colony in the 1820s.<ref name=":2" /> In 1822, a man named Bray settled along the bayou, possibly providing its name.<ref name=":2" />
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[[File:Aerial_view_of_Hermann_Park,_Harris_Gulley_and_Brays_Bayou_looking_north.jpg|thumb|1925 view of Brays Bayou looking north. The forested area is today the Texas Medical Center. Rice University and Memorial Hermann Hospital can be seen at the top left, and Hermann Park can be seen at the top right. Harris Gully, which has been rerouted into an underground [[culvert]], runs from the left side of the photograph into Brays.]]
By the first half of the 20th century, [[suburb]]s of Houston had reached the banks of Brays Bayou. [[Rice University]] was established on a large plot of land adjacent to Harris Gully, a tributary of the bayou, in 1912, and the [[University of Houston]] was established just north of the bayou in the [[Third Ward, Houston|Third Ward]] in 1927. Harrisburg was annexed by the city in 1926. During the 1930s, [[Riverside Terrace, Houston|Riverside Terrace]], south of the [[Third Ward, Houston|Third Ward]], became home to the large forested estates of Houston's wealthy [[Jews|Jewish]] community, which had been [[Residential segregation in the United States|segregated]] out of [[River Oaks, Houston|River Oaks]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.houstonpress.com/news/houston-101-the-forgotten-mansions-of-riverside-terrace-6746665|title=Houston 101: The Forgotten Mansions of Riverside Terrace|last=Shilcutt|first=Katharine|date=2009-08-28|work=Houston Press|access-date=2017-03-24}}</ref> The [[Texas Medical Center]] began in the 1940s with the construction of the [[University of Texas MD Anderson Cancer Center|MD Anderson Cancer Center]].<ref>{{Cite news|url=http://www.tmc.edu/news/2014/08/building-a-city-of-medicine-the-history-of-the-texas-medical-center/|title=Building a City of Medicine: The History of the Texas Medical Center|last=Orlando|first=Alex|date=2014-08-19|work=Texas Medical Center News|access-date=2017-03-24|language=en-US}}</ref> [[Meyerland, Houston|Meyerland]], located immediately west of the southwest corner of [[Interstate 610 (Texas)|Interstate 610]], was opened in 1955 as one of Houston's first [[Planned community|master-planned communities]].<ref>{{Cite web|url=http://meyerland.net/en/tx/index.php/general-information/72-history-of-meyerland|title=History of Meyerland|website=Meyerland Community Improvement Association|access-date=2017-03-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170829090317/http://meyerland.net/en/tx/index.php/general-information/72-history-of-meyerland|archive-date=2017-08-29|url-status=dead}}</ref> Brays Bayou continues to serve as a [[Greenway (landscape)|greenway]] connecting these affluent neighborhoods and districts.
Like many other Houston bayous, Brays Bayou was [[River engineering|channelized]] by the [[United States Army Corps of Engineers]] between 1955 and 1960 after severe flooding earlier in the decade.<ref name=":1">{{Cite web|url=http://fas3.flood-alert.org/#Case%20Studies:Flood%20History|title=History: Flooding and Flood Policies|website=The Rice University and Texas Medical Center Flood Alert System (FAS3)|publisher=Rice University|access-date=2017-03-24}}</ref> By 1980, the Brays Bayou watershed was home to a population of over 412,000, and inadequate drainage infrastructure was still a major concern.<ref>{{Cite book|title=Buffalo Bayou and Tributaries Feasibility Report (Flood Damage Prevention)|last=|first=|publisher=[[United States Army Corps of Engineers]]|year=1988|isbn=|location=|pages=4A-16}}</ref> A 1976 flood caused major damage to the Medical Center, Rice University, the [[University of Houston]], and institutions in the [[Houston Museum District|Museum District]].<ref name=":1" /> Beginning in the 1970s, the Harris County Flood Control District began implementing restrictions on upstream development to reduce the likelihood of flooding.
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== Project Brays ==
The '''Brays Bayou Federal Flood Risk Reduction Project''', also known as '''Project Brays''', is an ongoing $480 million project by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers and the Harris County Flood Control District (HCFCD) to retrofit the Brays Bayou watershed with new and improved flood control infrastructure.<ref name=":3">{{Cite web|url=https://www.projectbrays.org/media/1885/projectbrays_maysummary_fin-2.pdf|title=Brays Bayou Federal Flood Risk Reduction Project: Fact Sheet|date=May 2015|website=Harris County Flood Control District|access-date=2017-03-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170325202620/https://www.projectbrays.org/media/1885/projectbrays_maysummary_fin-2.pdf|archive-date=2017-03-25|url-status=dead}}</ref> Overall, the project includes 75 individual components, including deepening and widening {{Convert|21|mi|km}} of the bayou, modifying or reconstructing 30 road bridges, and constructing four large stormwater [[detention basin]]s with a total capacity of {{Convert|3.5|e9gal|e9L}}.<ref name=":3" />
Planning for Project Brays began in 1988 when the Army Corps of Engineers released a [[cost–benefit analysis]] for a flood damage reduction project in the Brays watershed.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.projectbrays.org/about-project-brays/project-history/|title=Project History|website=Project Brays|publisher=Harris County Flood Control District|access-date=2017-03-24}}</ref> The Harris County Flood Control District took over planning and implementation of the project in 1998, and construction began in 2001. The project, which has a tentative completion date of 2021, has been continuously delayed by gaps in federal funding, though the urgency of the 2015 and 2016 floods has hastened efforts to complete it.<ref name=":4">{{Cite news|url=http://www.houstonchronicle.com/news/houston-texas/houston/article/Innovative-plan-could-break-logjam-on-flood-10878384.php|title=Innovative plan could break logjam on flood improvements|last=Morris|first=Mike|date=2017-01-23|work=Houston Chronicle|access-date=2017-03-25}}</ref>
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== Parkland ==
The Brays Bayou Greenway serves as an important [[linear park]] through a broad region of Houston, providing {{Convert|30|mi|km}} of [[Grade separation|grade-separated]] hike-and-bike trails.<ref name=":6">{{Cite web|url=http://houstonparksboard.org/projects/brays_bayou_greenway/|title=Brays Bayou Greenway|date=February 2017|website=Houston Parks Board|access-date=2017-03-24|archive-url=https://web.archive.org/web/20170314212408/http://houstonparksboard.org/projects/brays_bayou_greenway/|archive-date=2017-03-14|url-status=dead}}</ref> Under the City of Houston's Bayou Greenways 2020 project, Brays Bayou has been the focus of a number of projects to fill gaps in the trail network, add new park space, and provide increased connectivity to adjacent neighborhoods and across the bayou.<ref name=":6" />
Public parks which connect to the greenway include (from west to east): Mike Driscoll Park, Arthur Storey Park, [[Hermann Park]], MacGregor Park, and Mason Park. Arthur Storey Park doubles as a large stormwater detention basin which can hold up to {{Convert|1.1|e9gal|e9L}} (about 3,376 [[acre foot|acre feet]]) of water during flood events.<ref>{{Cite web|url=https://www.projectbrays.org/about-project-brays/project-highlights/arthur-storey-park-stormwater-detention-basin/|title=Arthur Storey Park Stormwater Detention Basin|website=Project Brays|publisher=Harris County Flood Control District|access-date=2017-03-24}}</ref>
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