Posted on October 22, 2020
Lake water level lowered by 3-4 feet
Work has begun on the Lakemont dredging project.
County employees this week opened the gates of the dam there, lowering the water level by 3 or 4 feet, according to officials at a meeting of the Intergovernmental Stormwater Committee on Thursday. The committee is working to fulfill a requirement to reduce the sediment that enters area streams by 1.4 million pounds per year by 2023.
Workers won’t release more water until contractor Glenn O. Hawbaker Inc. of State College installs filtration barriers to prevent large amounts of mud from entering Brush Run below the dam, according to Project Construction Manager Brian Shura of Stiffler McGraw and committee member Tom Levine, also an engineer.
Hawbaker first needs to draw up an erosion and sedimentation plan that needs to be approved by the ISC and the Blair County Conservation District, Shura said.
When it’s time to further “dewater” the lake, workers will remove timbers that are part of the dam gate assembly, according to Shura.
After that, the mud may be left to dry further, Shura indicated.
It will probably be a month or two before the actual dredging begins, Levine said.
Hawbaker has until
May 31 to complete the work.
Dredging the lake will once again allow it to become a catch basin for silt from Brush Run upstream, officials have said.
The Lakemont project is the centerpiece of the IRC’s Pollution Reduction Plan, which is designed to help reduce pollution in Chesapeake Bay.
The project is expected to reduce the annual sediment load by 544,000 pounds.
One component of the dam gate assembly is a guillotine-style panel, while another component is a panel hinged to fall forward — away from the impoundment, according to Shura.
The hinged panel is currently “non-functional,” he said.
It also includes a broken section, based on direct observation.
The gate assembly also includes stationary sections with stacked timbers in slots on either side of the operational panels.
On Thursday evening, there was a congregation of fish just behind the dam, in an area that still had some depth.
The estimated 30,000 cubic yards of silt that workers will eventually take from the bottom of the pond will be trucked to Antis Township and deposited near the site of a large waste-coal pile that is scheduled for removal to accommodate a trail project.
The Lakemont silt will be used as topsoil on the site, which is expected to become a series of athletic fields.
Mirror Staff Writer William Kibler is at 949-7038.
Source: altoonamirror
