From the 1940s to the 1970s, industrial plants discharged high levels of PCBs and toxic metals into New Bedford Harbor, a prominent commercial fishing port in Massachusetts. As part of a suite of restoration projects in Massachusetts, NOAA, the state, and the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service installed two fish passages on the Acushnet River to help herring over dams as they migrate between the Atlantic and their spawning grounds in rivers. Since these projects were installed in 2007, the number of herring passing over the dams has increased by more than 1,000%.