So, in 1936, the city awakened to the need for some sort of systematic flood control. The U. S. Army Corps of Engineers was consulted and the flood control program that included Barker and Addicks Reservoirs was approved in 1940.

The launch site on Memorial Mews is located on the spillway channel from Addicks Reservoir along the former course of South Mayde Creek. Within 100 yards, the channel joins Buffalo Bayou in a section that was channelized as a part of the flood control program that was completed in 1946. Below Barker Dam, the bayou was straightened from Highway 6 to Wilcrest
Road.

Harris County has developed the channelized beltway into Terry Hershey Park from designs proposed in 1987 by county landscape architect Mike Cunnigham. The hike and bike trails extends seven miles from Highway 6 to Wilcrest, with future extensions as far as Beltway 8.

A paved hike and bike path on the north side of the bayou is heavily used by walkers, joggers and recreational bike riders. Serious mountain bikers test their skills on the rugged dirt paths, known as the Ant Hills, that wind along the south side of Buffalo Bayou from Eldridge Road to Wilcrest.

Post-WWII residential development in the area west of Houston has led to the construction of three road bridges in the four mile stretch from Memorial Mews to Wilcrest. The first bridge, encountered shortly after entering Buffalo Bayou is Eldridge Road. Eldridge Road has been extended from Sugar Land within the past 15 years. The road was named for William T. Eldridge who was the first manager of the Imperial Sugar Company. Mr. Eldridge, who died in 1932, built the company town with 435 homes for the workers, stores and the farms in Sugar Land.

Prior to the channelization of the bayou, the Houston Museum of Natural Science sponsored an archeological survey of the bayou. Although a well-known, and often plundered, site near Highway 6, known as the Habermacher Mound site, was excavated, the survey downstream identified an archeological site on the south side of the bayou about 200 feet east of the old
Dairy-Ashford Road. A second site was located about 1500 feet downstream on the north side of the bayou. All of these sites have been destroyed by the flood control project.

The Dairy-Ashford Road bridge is the next bridge encountered. The old road connected the rail stops of Ashford on the Houston & Texas Central Railroad in northwest Harris County and Dairy on the San Antonio & Arkansas Pass Railroad, located between Jeanetta and Clodine in western Harris County. The community of Dairy, or Dairy Station, was first settled by a Mr. Reynolds in1861 who owned 1,250 acres of land near the headwaters of Brays Bayou. County surveyors, in 1894, named the community Dairy, but when the application was made for a post office, the name was changed to Alief in honor of the first postmistress Alief Ozella Magee.

About a mile below the Dairy-Ashford bridge is the property of the Lakeside Country Club along the south side of the bayou. Designed by architect Ron Pritchard and built in 1952, the Lakeside Country Club is a private 18-hole golf club located at 100 Wilcrest Dr.

The Wilcrest Road bridge signals the end of this section of the bayou. Immediately below the bridge is a landing / launch site on the north side of the bayou. Steps coming down the steep bank provide access to the bikeway trail.