The Coaster

By DON STINE
Donna Logden, owner of the Sunset Landing in Asbury Park, is no stranger to Deal Lake and its problems, particularly flooding.

Logden’s property is the lowest on the 150-acre lake and the first to flood during severe storms.

“Deal Lake never flooded when I was young and now flooding is a major and constant concern,” she said.

Logden said she believes many issues affect flooding in Deal Lake, such as major construction projects that increase silt and water runoff into the lake – the largest in Monmouth County.

“Municipalities really haven’t addressed these issues. The added silt and runoff just increases the water level in the lake. It’s a big concern for me – both in damage to my property and the cost to cleanup after floods,” she said.

And Lodgen is not alone – many properties along the lake have been damaged due to recent storms and flooding.

Logden said that a major storm in 1992 brought lot of sand from the ocean into the very eastern section of the lake and that, in 2005, another flood in the lake brought up to three inches of water into her business along with mud and other debris.

“The sand at the eastern end of the lake still hasn’t been dredged,” she said

Logden said she would like to see more people knowledgeable about the lake get involved and would like to see improvements to the flume controlling the water level at the eastern end.

“I’d like to see somebody who has insight control the water level when storms are coming,” she said.

John Everson, chairman of the Deal Lake Commission, said many of Logden’s concerns and comments are well taken.

“Many of Donna’s points are quite valid and the commission is undertaking various projects and making several recommendations to local and county officials to help remedy the situation,” he said.

The Deal Lake Commission was formed in 1974 by the seven municipalities surrounding the 150-acre lake. The commission is funded by contributions from the municipalities based on their amount of shoreline along the lake.

“The commission’s role is solely to oversee lake activities, monitor and investigate environmental conditions, contract for remediation and provide a unified voice of behalf of the lake,” Everson said.

The commission has issued the first-ever state of the lake report that is a compilation of years of study and research helping to understand the problems of the lake. The report will be used to implement and seek funding for remedial projects regarding the lake.

The lake originally flowed into the Atlantic Ocean but the inlet was sealed off around 1885 and replaced with a flume system that still exists today.

The lake’s water level is lowered by means of a flume gate at the very eastern end of the lake between Loch Arbor and Asbury Park. The gate is manually opened or closed to control the amount of water in the lake and the released water flows under Ocean Avenue into the Atlantic Ocean.

The normal water level of Deal Lake is only 3.8 feet above mean high tide.

Low tides in the ocean allow the water to flow from the lake whereas high tides, particularly during storms, can actually force salt water back into the lake. It is not unusual to see crabs in the brackish water at the eastern end of the lake and herring enter the lake yearly through the flume to spawn.

The flume was replaced by the state Department of Environmental Protection in 1986 and the flow pipe into the ocean was extended by 400 feet in 2006 after the beach replenishment project prevented the herring from entering the lake to spawn.

In 2007 the flume received about $3,200 in repairs but the raising and lowering of the gate is still done manually and one of the commission’s goals in to have a new flume gate installed and have it electrified with an optional manual operation.

Also, the concrete floor at the small flume building needs to be inspected and a new roof installed.

The estimated cost to make repairs at the flume gate house is $80,000, according to the commission’s report.

The report documents that about 90 percent of the 4500-acre watershed for Deal Lake has been developed without retention basins, debris traps, or advanced stormwater controls.

Several upper-level ponds at the western sections of the lake have completely silted in, even though certain sections have been dredged in recent years.

“The silt is now moving into the more eastern sections of the lake during storms,” Everson said.

“As the lake’s watershed area was developed over the years all of the storm water was simply piped into the lake or its tributaries. This created a superhighway for silt and development in the watershed area only made the problem worse. In effect, Deal Lake became an inexpensive 155-acre regional storm water basin for the surrounding towns, county roads, state highways and large shopping centers,” he said

The commission is proposing that each municipality around the lake adopt a Zero Silt Runoff ordinance. Current state stormwater regulations require only 80 percent, according to the report.

The ordinance would require every residential and commercial owner to keep all disturbed sand and soil contained on their property or else be subject to a stiff fine and have to pay an assessment to the Deal Lake Commission that would be used for silt-removal projects in the future.

“With only limited open land left in the watershed we need to seriously look at where large, regional stormwater basins can be created to retain stormwater from going into the lake. We also need to encourage ways to allow better infiltration of stormwater back into the ground,” Everson said.

“We need to partner this with private and public landholders and this will require participation from the county, the state, and the land owners,” he said.

Everson said such partnerships could also result in some sort of tax break for private property owners.

Editor’s Note: The following is one in a series of articles that will appear in The Coaster regarding Deal Lake, its problems and proposed solutions.

This entry was posted on Thursday, September 11, 2008 at 12:10 pm and is filed under Asbury Park, The Environment. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can skip to the end and leave a response. Pinging is currently not allowed.