GBRA may drain four more lakes in its system

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The Guadalupe Blanco River Authority was expected to discuss the potential draining of an additional four lakes in the GBRA’s mandated authority area at its regularly scheduled meeting in Seguin yesterday. At press time on Wednesday morning, the GBRA Board of Directors and staff were to meet to discuss the idea of draining the Lakes at McQueeney, Gonzales, Meadow and Placid over public safety concerns related to possible dam failures at those lakes. Over the past few years, the dams at Lake Wood in Gonzales and Lake Dunlap near New Braunfels both failed due to breaks in the spring dam infrastructure.

Engineers for the GBRA have decided that the dams of McQueeny, Gonzales, Meadow and Placid all have the same spring dam construction that caused the breaking of the dams at Lake Wood and Lake Dunlap. They have told the management of the GBRA that the four dams are also in danger of breaking, citing public safety concerns over the potential damage caused by another dam failure. GBRA management has already acknowledged publicly that “it is only a matter of time before the Lake McQueeney dam fails.”

The GBRA has told interested groups of the lakes that it will cost at least $15 million to repair each dam, and the total price tag might take up to $35 million for each dam. Engineering studies on dam construction are ongoing, but not a lot of progress has been made in that area in the three years since the first dam at Lake Wood failed.

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