Elevating the Tamiami Trail is part of the Modified Waters Delivery program to restore the broad, shallow flow of water, or sheet flow, that created the Everglades and is needed to maintain the Everglades National Park's health. The $323.2-million C-111 South Dade Project also serves Mod Waters by creating a seepage barrier that helps keep the additional water in Everglades National Park. With three pump stations and a detention area, it is now about 75% complete.

The $620-million Picayune Strand project was the first CERP project to be constructed. The project is converting back into its natural state 55,000 acres of a failed development. Canals have been plugged and roads removed; spreader canals with three pump stations are now being constructed. Two pump stations are scheduled for completion by this fall and the last by fall 2017.

Ecosystem benefits are beginning to appear. "We have seen some changes in salinity levels and in aquatic vegetation," says Eric Draper, Audubon of Florida's executive director. "The marshes seem to be a bit healthier, and Picayune Strand is showing very impressive signs of transition to what the original was like." In the Kissimmee River basin, observed changes include expanded wetlands with swelling populations of largemouth bass and sunfish and a robust, growing diversity of birds, says USACE's Gonzales.

Cost escalation is inevitable in a program as huge, long-running and complex as CERP. When authorized in WRDA 2000, its estimated cost was $7.8 billion; it is now $13.5 billion. While much of that is for purchasing land, there is a large allotment for professional-services fees, says Blake Guillory, executive director of the South Florida Water Management District, the state agency responsible for CERP. "We could have a dozen big projects in the next few years," he says. Thirteen teams comprising 105 separate member firms are on board for design work worth some $90 million in fees, he notes.