Shoring up I-95 a risk to dam

Irving Boynton and Frank Chamberlin looked a little envious as state biologists dropped their electronic fishing poles into the waters of the Taylor River dam impoundment.

Envious because these fishing poles were tipped with 4-foot steel cables wired to a 1,000-volt battery pack: Just throw the switch and scoop up the fish.

"This pond is some of the best bass and pickerel fishing I've ever seen," Chamberlin said as he watched from the shore outside his home at Taylor River Estates last Wednesday.

"My grandkids come down here kayaking," he said.

"I taught them how to fish here. If they take that dam out of here, I don't know what's going to happen. This is just going to be a marsh."

The need to decide what to do with the Taylor River dam has put this popular fishing hole's future in peril and has embroiled residents and state environmental officials in a two-year debate.

The problem is that the dam holding back the impoundment is tied into a tiny span holding up Interstate 95, and that span is starting to crumble.

The fish taken on Wednesday will be tested for the banned pesticide DDT, which was found in sediment samples taken last year. Warning signs will be post ed if the results come back positive, said Cheri Patterson, a marine biologist with the state's Department of Fish and Game.

The testing is a small piece of the bigger puzzle of what to do with the dam and how its fate will affect the idyllic waterfront community behind it.

"This is a risk assessment to see if there is a public health concern," Patterson said. "But the bridge and the dam are one component, and that's what started this whole process, the decision about what to do with the dam."

Dam is a generous term for the roughly 6-foot-tall structure narrow enough to fit into an average living room. The Taylor River could as easily be called a stream.

The complex of inch-thick steel sheeting holding back the river is tied into similarly constructed walls supporting a bridge over I-95. However, an inspection in 2005 found that the steel walls were deteriorating and that repairs have to be made.

The easiest solution is to build a new bridge about 100 yards to the south, according to Robert Landry, a project manager with the state's Department of Transportation, which owns and maintains the dam and the bridge.

That leaves the question of what to do with the dam. It was originally built when I-95 was constructed, but is not needed to support the bridge, Landry said.

There are signs that the dam and a similarly deteriorated overflow culvert near it may be hampering natural herring runs.

"Removal of the dam would be the best option for the river's health," Patterson said. "It would improve the water quality. And, if you improve the water quality, you improve the overall ecological quality of the area."

Area residents including Boynton and Chamberlin aren't so sure, and they promise to fight any such changes in the impoundment "tooth and nail," Chamberlin said. Patterson and Landry both said the state is completely undecided on the issue.

For two years, officials have been meeting with residents to discuss the fate of the dam. The discovery of pesticides in the impound ment sediments prompted the fishing trip last Wednesday, but it's all part of a $400,000 feasibility study that will ultimately decide what gets built where, Landry said.

"It's really a tough situation; that's why we're doing the study," he said. "We want to see whether or not the best thing for the environment and the people adjacent to the impoundment is to replace or remove the dam."

Removal would probably change the impoundment area from a fresh water environment to a salt marsh estuary where fresh and salt waters mix, Patterson said.

That would mean no more bass and pickerel.

Boynton thinks otherwise. "It would have to be a heck of a tidal surge to bring salt water in here," he said. "I don't think there was ever salt water in here."

What would happen instead, both men said, is that the impound ment would disappear and that what is now a great source of recreation would ultimately become a swamp.

Patterson said the fate of the impoundment will be part of the $400,000 study. The New Hampshire Coastal Program, a federally funded state program overseen by the state's Department of Environmental Services, says that taking out the dam will return the Taylor River to its natural state and that that is always preferable to manmade impoundments.

"Dams have a variety of negative impacts on river ecosystems," said Beth Lambert, the program's coastal restoration specialist. "We'll see fresh water fish and fresh water plants, but we're losing out on the natural species that would be living there, and that's often more abundant than what you find in the fresh water impoundments"

All agreed that it's hard to say at this point what will replace the impoundment if the dam is removed. Chamberlin said the river otters, bald eagles, and moose he has seen outside his windows, not to mention the fishing he enjoys from his shore, will probably suffer if the impoundment is drained.

However, all also agree something has to be done with the dam. Taylor River Estates suffered serious flooding damage during the Mother's Day storm last year and more recently during the northeaster over Patriots Day Weekend.

The Taylor River Estates Homeowners Association opposes removing the dam.

"Whatever they do, we don't want them to drain this," Boynton said. "It's good what they are doing now, to see if the fish are clean or not, but we don't want the water level to change."