BIKEPGH MESSAGE BOARD ARCHIVE

All clear, rideable, a little crowded on weekends.

Eagle Lake, on the Mon trail, is pretty robust.   Six or seven  inches deep and stable.

I'm going to take a ride out there with a shovel one of these days and see if anything can be done so this can drain even a tiny bit easier. I promise I won't jump the fence. Lake Perrymont needs routine attention, so it might be something as simple as clearing leaves from what little drainage path the thing gets. I realize a proper solution requires a backhoe on the other side of the fence, but even lowering the top of the lake one inch would make a significant difference.

For EAgle Lake, I'd guess the best course would be to wait for a dry spell to evaluate drainage options.   There might be something that could be cleared out that would not be visible under the water. Next time I go by, I'll try to take a look at it. I've had extensive professional experience with shovels.  I am a worldly sophisticate.

I looked at Eagle Lake today. Trying to improve drainage with a shovel is not a good option.   No where to drain to.     Eagle Lake has as much, or more area on the other side of the fence.  Same level.  Even if we went go over the fence, we would need a ditch several hundred yards long. There is a little stream flowing from a 20 inch (or so) pipe under the railroad tracks into the lake.   I call it Eagle Creek. .  Today It had a flow about the same as 4 or 5 running toilettes. Eagle Creek follows a 10 yards stream to the lake, through two little pools.   One of them is 6 or 8 feet across and 3 or 4 feet deep.   I poked a staff at the bottom, but I could not tell if there was any mucked up outflow there.   I'm guessing not.  Maybe I can check if there is a long dry spell. The culvert from the the other side of the RR tracks comes from a ditch.  The ditch is about 400 yards long, 2 yards wide and not very deep at all.  It's partly fed by a 20 inch (or so) pipe that comes from under Carson street - but the flow out of that is less than half of what flows through the pipe under the track, so there has to be another water source.   If the pipe at the start of EAgle Creek woul be blocked  (This would be fairly serious vandalism of RR property.  No one here would ever do that.)   BUT if it were blocked, Eagle lake could dry up.  Maybe. I the water in the ditch got a foot or two higher, it might drain through the end of the scrapyard property.  This appeared to be free for drainage, but is currently dry, so who knows.  The other thing that could happen would be the water might flow through the porous ballast under the tracks - and thereby preserve the splendor that is EagleLake. Now, it appears someone long ago tried to block the south end of the pipe under the tracks  with railroad ballast.  The water going into the pipe is simply flowing through the ballast.  The ballast is so porous that the flow is unimpeded. If someone poured a few wheelbarrows of non-porous clay or some kind of muck there it might stop the flow - but I saw nothing in the area that was even remotely suitable. My take?  Three or 4 days work with a backhoe could probably do it  long ditch to the end of the scrapyard property woudl do it fine. Three or 4 bags of concrete fouling the Eagle Creek Culvert might work, but might also be a serous crime AND not work. And that's today's news from Eagle lake.  

I was hoping a thin ditch could be dug parallel to the fence for a few feet, in hopes it could help draw off some of the water. Wouldn't involve either railroad or scrapyard property. The last time I was out there, it was pouring rain already so I had no inclination to investigate.

If Eagle Lake could be drained in a hour or two with a shovel,   it would have been gone long ago.