Update: 3rd Street & Broomall’s Lake
There is a conference about the 3rd Street Litigation scheduled for March 31, 2014 between Media Borough, Broomall’s Lake Country Club (BLCC) and Delaware County. The conference is not open to the public, and will be before Judge Proud in the Delaware County Court of Common Pleas. A December 9, 2013 ruling by the Commonwealth of Pennsylvania had reinstated the 2011 Stipulation Agreement and returned the case to the Delaware County Courts to interpret that Stipulation Agreement. We will report when we learn the outcome of the March 31 conference.
Previously, a January 13, 2014 letter from Pennsylvania DEP (PA DEP) mailed to BLCC and addressed “Dear Dam Owner” included an updated dam registration and permit fee schedule. The water level of Broomall’s Lake has remained high since July 2013, contrary to PA DEP’s instructions to keep it lowered for public safety.
The Friends of Glen Providence Park continues to support dam removal, stream restoration and a local discussion of an environmentally-sensitive connection between Media Borough and Upper Providence.
You can read the January DEP letter here: DEP letter to BLCC 1-13-2014
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Hello!
My daughter is planning her Wedding to be at Broomall’s Lake Country Club. May 30, 2015 is the projected date. If the Damn were to be replaced what would be the time frame for reconstruction of the Lake and Damn.
Also I read from this web-site that, and I quote :
“The Friends of Glen Providence Park continues to support dam removal, stream restoration and a local discussion of an environmentally-sensitive connection between Media Borough and Upper Providence.”
So you are supporting REMOVAL of the lake in the upcoming project? Or is replacing the damn and restoring the lake the main project??
Would you please explain further?
Scott
Hi Scott,
The project to replace Broomall’s Dam has been in litigation, and it is difficult to say when construction will happen. There may be a ruling about the project in May, and if that resolves the outstanding issues, that would seem to be the earliest point that the engineers would be instructed to resume work on the dam. I believe that construction is limited to the months of April through October due to wildlife considerations, so the earliest that construction might occur would be April 2015. But it is unclear how long permitting with the PA DEP would take, so between planning and permitting it may well be 2016 or even later, and again that is if the litigation is even resolved.
You could try contacting Media Borough Manager Jeff Smith at 610-566-5210 about possible timing, as he may be able to give you a better prediction or estimate. But if there is a ruling in May, it should be more clear at that point what the timing might be.
To answer your second question, we do support dam removal in this project, which would remove the lake. When the plans for the Broomall’s Dam project were revealed in June 2011, we learned that instead of repairing the 1883 dam, the project would replace the dam with a new, much larger dam built to modern engineering standards – burying over 1/2 acre of the park in earthfill, and destroying 1 acre of the public park. So we support removing the dam and restoring the pre-1883 stream, which would cause much less damage to the park, and would re-create the natural waterfalls at what is now the dam (the water would still have to descend almost 30 feet!). It would be safer and not require the expensive future maintenance of a dam. For more information and reasons for our position, two places to start are:
– Information we distributed last August, with links: https://glenprovidencepark.org/2013/08/10/protect-the-park-remove-the-dam-restore-the-stream/
– Information with more links from February 2012 when we were investigating dam removal as an option: https://glenprovidencepark.org/2012/02/26/dam-removal-stream-restoration/
Thank you for your inquiry, and let me know if you have other questions. I hope your daughter has a lovely wedding!
Stephanie
I will add that BLCC might have information for you, as they are one of the responsible parties for the current and future dam. As far as we know, there is no planned restoration of the lake. It will be drained partially or fully during dam construction. Apparently it needs dredging but that is not part of the Third Street Project or reconstruction of Broomall’s Dam.
Congratulations to your daughter! Hope she has a beautiful wedding day.
Best,
Shannon