Agenda - 09-24-1979 - Laserfiche WebLink

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Mr. T. L. Waters, Manager September 18,1979 Page 2 This reservoir also serves as a back-up supply for Carrboro-Chapel Hill via a pipeline that was constructed in 1978. This past summer, Lake Ben Johnson supplied a million gallons of water a day to Carrboro-Chapel Hill to supplement their system. We are concerned that the quality of water flowing to this important Crater resource during the construction phase of this project: will be decreased. Construction of the road will result in increased activity in the watershed. Of particular concernis the potential for increased erosion due to the absence of vegetative cover. An increase in erosion and the movement of sediment to the stream system and ultimate- ly to the reservoir could have a number of impacts. These include (a) a negative impact on the plant and animal life in the affected streams; (b) increased sediment loads delivered to Lake Ben Johnson which could reduce its volume and therefore its effective life time as a reservoir for Hillsborough; (c) increased sediment reaching the water treatment plant intake which might result in greater treatment costs to meet State turbidity standards for water delivered by public water suppliers; (d) a decrease in other water quality parameters since sediment is the agent by which many toxic materials are carried into the surface water system. These toxic substances can affect the well being of water consumers. Due to the potential negative impacts of increased erosion and sedimenta- tion on Hillsborough's water supply, we hope that there will be careful planning by DOT so that these impacts can be kept to a minimum during the construction phase of this proposed project. Our second concern regarding the watershed has to do with the potential for accidential spills of hazardous materials that increasing traffic on I-85 will bring. Release of these materials into Lake Ben Johnson and Seven Mile Creek reservior when it is constructed could have disasterous results. The proposed changes to I-85 provide an oppor- tunity to incorporate design features into the drainage system in the vicinity of the highway which could serve to contain any spills of hazardous materials long enough to allow them to be cleaned up before they could reach the stream system in significant amounts. For example, provision of retention areas along sections of highway which are in close proximity to streams flowing to these existing and potential reservoirs is one obvious design measure which might be used. We are sure that the engineers responsible for this project can devise and incorporate many other more sophisticated design features which would greatly reduce the threat to the Hillsborough water supply. (2) Miles Community: A. preliminary sketch,of the proposed redesign of the Buckhorn Road interchange sent to us by Mr. Tom Hepler of your depart- ment shows a new alignment of SR 1374 (GE Service Road) at its intersec- tion with Buckhorn Road. Unfortunately this proposed realignment places the new section of SR 1374 squarely through the Miles community, the long time home of a number of Orange County residents. The presence of such a road will serve to divide the neighborhood physically and in more