Community Corner

Braddock Residents, County Officials Discuss Dredging of Royal Lake

Representatives from the Fairfax County Stormwater Planning Division, along with Supervisor John Cook, presented preliminary design plans to the community to remove sediment from Royal Lake.

Around 40 Braddock District residents joined Supervisor John Cook and representatives from the Fairfax County Stormwater Planning Division Monday night at Robinson Secondary School to discuss the Royal Lake Restoration and Dredging Project.

The goal of the meeting was to gather resident feedback about the project, which will reach its final design phase by winter 2013.

The intent behind the Royal Lake Restoration and Dredging Project is to remove approximately 101,500 cubic yards of sediment, or dredging, from the lake and improve the quality of the lake water while providing long-term maintenance improvements. Royal Lake is located south of Commonwealth Boulevard near at least five Braddock District communities.

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Royal Lake is one of five facilities managed by the Stormwater Planning Division in the Pohick Creek Watershed. Royal Lake will be the third lake to be dredged as part of the dredging schedule. Lake Barton was dredged in 2011, Huntsman Lake will go to construction in June and Woodglen Lake is in the design phase.

Why the Need to Dredge Royal Lake?

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Matthew Meyers, project coordinator with the Fairfax County Stormwater Planning Division and Chad Davis, Water Resources manager with Baker, led the hourlong presentation and answered resident questions for an additional hour following the presentation.

Meyers said the quantity of the sediment present and the surface area of Royal Lake set it apart from previous dredging projects. Royal Lake has 37.5 acres of surface area and 2,477 acres, or 3.67 square miles, of drainage area. Currently, there’s an estimated 100,400 cubic yards of sediment in the lake.

Residents in the audience did not seem surprised by the numbers, as many said they’ve noticed the decline in appearance and declining wildlife habitat numbers at the lake, particularly the number of fish present. For that reason, many urged Meyers and his team to take the project as seriously as the residents are.

“Please pay more attention to this lake. This lake is used by thousands of people. With the holidays coming, it’s important to know that something’s being done,” said one resident. “We need it for people around this neighborhood. If you don’t fix it now, we won’t have a lake in 10 years.”

Meyers assured the audience that the county understands and shares the desire to save Royal Lake from further erosion and pollution.

“This is something we couldn’t do five years ago, so we’re fortunate to have a dedicated stormwater task team to work on this,” said Meyers.

The majority of the sediment from Royal Lake is coming from stream banks and residential homes, said Meyers, which is why the county warns residents against dumping oil and other damaging waste down drains to accumulate in streams and lakes.

Meyers said the amount of trucks used for the project will vary, based on the type of equipment the contractor uses. Lake Barton, Meyer said, saw as many as 40 trucks per day and up to 50 trucks on a good day, with two operations occurring on either side of the lake.

The trucks will not be parked in residential areas, but in staging areas the contractor will create. The trucks will also use the existing access road when construction begins.

Impact of Construction on the Lake and the Community

The project will work on dredging areas of the lake in multiple zones and two phases. The first phase will remove 40,000 cubic yards of sediment. The goal of the second phase is to remove an additional 60,000 cubic yards.

Meyers estimates that phase one of the project will take 5-6 months and phase two would take 9-12 months to complete. The site restoration will take longer than the actual dredging process.

Meyers said public and pedestrian access would still be allowed during construction. 

“Our goal is to continue to allow people to walk around the lake,” said Meyers.

The goal is to place trucks and much of the equipment on the existing access road and maintain access to the existing parking lot and the park itself. Pedestrian gates will also be provided so that residents can continue accessing trails around the lake.

Some residents expressed concerns about losing some of the habitat in the lake during the dredging process, but a representative with the Park Authority said he guessed the wildlife impact would be less than it has been in the past during this process.

The Dredging or Sentiment Removal Process

There are two methods used to remove sediment: in the dry and in the wet. When a lake is dredging in the wet, the construction company establishes access and staging areas to the lake and completes the dredges using barges. The wet sediment is removed and taken to a disposal site for drying. With wet dredging, Davis said there’s a quicker, initial start and less potential for project delays because of weather. The downsides to wet dredging is it could potentially have a higher cost due to the increased sediment-handling effort. The sediment removal rate is also slower compared to dry dredging.

According to the presentation, with dry dredging, the lake would have to be drained before access and staging areas for equipment can be established. Crews would have to wait for the sediment in the lake to dry and create diversion channels that would prevent water coming in to the areas where the dredging is occurring. The sediment removal rate would be higher with this method. However, with dry dredging, equipment and time could both be lost depending on the weather. There’s also the potential for an odor from the exposed sediment to be present in the area. Any fish present in the lake would also have to be relocated to other lakes.

The lake restoration part of the project will include restocking the lake with fish, stabilizing the shoreline, which Davis called pretty good around Royal Lake, and creating some wetland planting.

Cost of the Project and the Bidding Process

Meyers said the project and both methods of dredging will be presented in a competitive bid process where companies can present their construction plans to complete the project. The best bid presented wins.

The base budget for the project, which is calculated based on the cost per cubic yard of sediment, is $2.6 million, according to Meyers. A full dredging project could cost as much as $6.5 million. The Fiscal Year 2015 for the Fairfax County budget begins July 1, 2014, so a contract can’t be awarded to a contractor until that time.

When asked for clarification regarding the funding for the budget, Cook explained that the money for the project already exists, but for technical and legal reasons, the county can’t approve spending for projects past a certain deadline.

“Legally, I can’t tell you we’re going to approve this, but the funding is already there. It’s paid for with your two pennies on the rate and the project is on the books. We’re committed to the program and we don’t spend millions on design to drop it,” said Cook.

Cook assured residents that they would not ignore the project and compared it to the Fairfax County Public Schools process of funding for renovations. “There’s only so much you can do in one year and you keep going down the list. [Royal Lake] is next on the list, so it’s going to happen. We’re not going to ignore it,” said Cook.

Although Meyers said companies have to prove they are capable of completing the project, some residents raised concerns about the cost of the project influencing the type of bid the county accepted. One resident urged the county to consider the quality of work a company is capable of over a lower bid that promises to get the dredging done for less and in a shorter amount of time.

At the end of the meeting, residents left seemingly satisfied with the information presented and expressed gratitude for the opportunity to learn more about the project and thanked Cook, Anthony Vellucci, Braddock District Representative for the Fairfax County Park Authority Board, and the Fairfax County Park Authority for their work.


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