NEWS

As Corps studies lowered river, homeowners are stuck with mud

Tom Corwin
tcorwin@augustachronicle.com
US Army Corps of Engineers spokesman Russell Wicke talks to the press and a group of concerned citizens about the lowered water level test and the future of the New Savannah Bluff Lock and Dam during a press conference at the Jessye Norman Amphitheatre in Augusta, Ga., February 14, 2019.  [MICHAEL HOLAHAN/THE AUGUSTA CHRONICLE]

John Hill and his neighbors in the RiverNorth area of North Augusta all seem to have similar pictures on their phones – docks jutting out of or sitting on long stretches of brown mud with a thin line of the Savannah River in the background.

About 30 people showed up Thursday on Riverwalk Augusta to form an unsmiling half circle around a spokesman of the Savannah District of the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers as he explained to reporters why the river had been deliberately shrunk in the past several days and the agency's plan to keep it that way after New Savannah Bluff Lock and Dam is removed and replaced by a rock weir allowing migratory fish to get through.

The weir and fish passage are part of the Savannah Harbor Expansion Project and serve as mitigation for damage that project is causing to spawning grounds in the river near Savannah from the harbor deepening, which is allowing saltwater to creep further up the river, spokesman Russell Wicke said. The passage near Augusta would allow endangered fish such as the shortnose and Atlantic sturgeon to access historic spawning grounds in the Augusta shoals currently blocked by the 80-year-old lock and dam, he said.

"The only way to really mitigate for those species from the deepening is to get them past the lock and dam," Wicke said.

The Water Infrastructure Improvements for the Nation Act of 2016 de-authorized the lock and dam because it no longer served its purpose of facilitating barge traffic on the river – the last one went through in 1979 – but also directed the corps to preserve the pool of water in place when the act passed for recreation and to provide a water supply for cities and industries. The Corps could either repair the lock wall and modify the structure so fish could get through it or build the rock weir to hold the pool and still allow fish to get over it, Wicke said. The most economical solution was the weir and the option chosen has the highest wall without causing flooding but will result in a pool 3 1/2 feet lower at the lock and dam and up to 2 feet lower at the Fifth Street bridge and downtown Augusta.

The lowered river pool now is part of a simulation to show what the river would look like once the weir is built and corps engineers and experts showed up in the Augusta area Thursday to begin making their own observations and readings. The corps was using two boats going up and down the river, one flying a drone to take aerial photos, taking measurements and depths at various points, Wicke said. So far, there have been no surprises, he said.

"What we're finding today is exactly what we expected to see," Wicke said, at the lower end of average flow. The conditions will continue for about a week and the water will begin rising again Wednesday.

That can't come quick enough for Hill and neighbors James Smith and Scott Koonts, who are staring out at great muddy flats where river water once stood.

RiverNorth "was built as a place where you could get out and boat" and enjoy the river, Smith said. "The people who live there, they enjoy that."

If the muddy conditions become a permanent future "it’s going to hurt everybody," he said. "It’s completely ruined our neighborhood as far as a boat area. Plus the real estate values, who knows what it does to that?"

You can sue them and delay them but you are never going to get any money" to make up for the losses, Koonts said.

"We need to support our officials and hope these officials will fight the battle for us because it is the only way we’re going to win," Hill said. "They’re not going to listen to the homeowner but they’ll listen (to them)."

The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers Savannah District has tentatively set a town hall for March 6 in Augusta for the public to hear from and ask questions of its experts on the plan to build a rock weir to replace New Savannah Bluff Lock and Dam. A location has not yet been finalized for the meeting.

Public hearing March 6