Dams in the Adirondacks

In the reading for this past weekend, Terrie mentioned an attempt to build a dam on the South Branch of the Moose River in 1955 that was defeated by citizen environmentalists. The dam would have been built on public and private land, and the flooding caused by the dam would have affected thousands of more acres of both private land and forest preserve. Terrie writes about the defeat of this project as a triumphant moment for locals to stand up for the government, but as I read it, I remembered other dams that I had seen in forest preserve land in the Adirondacks, including popular areas like Marcy Dam and Lake Colden.

I found an article by Phil Brown, stating that there are over 50 dams in the Adirondacks right now, 6 of which are on "Forever Wild" lands. These dams were built before the land was taken into the forest preserve, but they bring up an interesting question of whether land can be considered "wild" when they have such obviously disrupting human-built structures. It is hard to consider an area called "Marcy Dam" truly wild when its own name refers to an artificial object that has such a huge--arguably negative--influence on the natural environment.

One of these dams on forest preserve land, the one at the Flowed Lands near Lake Colden, has recently been destroyed by the tropical storm Irene. The dam was already in some disrepair, and when it was blown down the state decided not to rebuild it. The State Land Master Plan does allow for rebuilding and repair of dams in wilderness areas that are already in place, so the DEC would not be breaking the law by fixing the dam, but part of their argument for not building the dam is to not interfere with the landscape any more than people already have. The other part of the argument, of course, is the amount of money it would take to bring in all of the materials and equipment to rebuild the dam, which is probably a very important factor in the DEC's decision making process. Interestingly, the body of water created by the dam--Duck Hole--is known as one of the most beautiful parts of the Northville-Placid Trail across the Adirondacks, so many people argue that rebuilding a dam would actually help the natural beauty of the area. This seems counter intuitive to the notion of dams as man-made, destructive structures, and complicates the issue of whether or not the dam should be rebuilt.

Duck Hole, before Irene

After destruction of the dam

Here is the Phil Brown article: http://www.adirondackexplorer.org/stories/dams-and-wilderness