There is no plan for getting rid of the car bodies, or for that matter any of the riprap, but current regulations prohibit the use of cars, as well as concrete containing reinforcement bar, for streambank stabilization.

Todd Tillinger, state program manager for the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers in Helena, said the corps does have the authority to make landowners remove materials that obstruct navigation or constitute a threat to river users, but it also realizes what a huge hardship that would be to most people.

“That’s something that’s a pretty serious thing to do,” he said. “It’s not something we do very frequently.”

In many cases, he said, the cars are protecting residences or public infrastructure and would have to be replaced with some other form of riprap if they were removed. It might be possible in some areas to simply cover the cars with several feet of soil and plant vegetation on top of them, he said.

Mother Nature has already done that in some cases, covering old car bodies with river silt during high water and then seeding the dirt with grass seed and other vegetation.