Water controversy all too predictable

Dan Bieker Albemarle County
Published: June 1, 2008

Controversy that has developed over the current water plan (Ragged Mountain Reservoir expansion and pipeline) should not be surprising, as details come to light. Benefits of the plan certainly cannot be denied, but respected conservationists and economists can offer valid arguments why the plan is not the most cost-effective or least environmentally damaging option, as officials assert. A cost/benefit comparison would seem to be a draw at best.

Improved stream flows, especially for the Moormans River, are a major force behind the water plan, and rightfully so. Courageous citizens have fought for years to improve river flow. The water issue comes down to storage capacity; but any scenario, not just the current plan, that increases capacity can increase stream flows; it’s simple physics. The health and volume of the Moormans does not depend solely on the proposed plan.

Listening to officials espouse the benefits of the plan, one might think it’s a heaven-sent answer. A national model? Hardly. The truth is we could improve stream flows all over the country by using massive amounts of horsepower to pump water uphill to storage reservoirs, at $100s of millions per project, but is that an answer? Even if this project is the lesser of evils, one might think twice before trumpeting that as a national model. Not to mention the tremendous (and glossed-over) destruction that will take place at Ragged Mountain Natural Area — not only the loss of trees, but the fragmentation of contiguous forest by miles of roads to facilitate improvements to the interstate.

At what point does the expense of this project make it a tragic boondoggle? The jail expansion fiasco a few years ago, and the way in which the proposed U.S. 29 western bypass estimates seemed to double in cost every few years, come to mind. 

Ratepayers’ wallets have been entrusted to an engineering firm that, based on some other estimates, substantially overstated the cost of dredging. If costs rise at the rate that its consulting fees have risen, we are indeed about to be hosed.