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Tuesday, November 6, 2007
Water under the dam
The Atlanta Journal-Constitution
Longtime Gwinnett boosters must dream about the dam that got away.
In 1973, the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers proposed building a second reservoir on the Chattahoochee River. The Re-Regulation Dam was proposed to help ensure that metro Atlanta and the region’s downstream neighbors would have a sufficient supply of drinking water in future decades.
The dam was never built.
In 1988, the corps abruptly withdrew its support for the “Re-Reg Dam.”
The decision infuriated metro Atlanta leaders, who’d spent a combined $2 million on studies — and a lot of political capital — pitching the controversial proposal to the public. Manuel Maloof, then DeKalb County’s chief executive officer, used words we couldn’t print.
The $25 million dam, which would have been built a few miles downstream from Lake Lanier, would have slowed the flow of water from the lake. It would have made it possible for water used to generate electricity to be pumped back into the lake and re-used.
In GwinnettForum.com, the online newsletter published by former AJC columnist Elliot Brack, former Gwinnett Commissioner Marion Buice lamented the dam that never was.
“If we had built the dam back then, and we pushed hard for it, it would have given us water storage today, would have cost far less than such a facility would today,” he said.
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