UPTON – Its specific age unclear, the gatehouse of Lower Dam on the Rapid River is no more. The dam hasn’t held back water since 1962, according to Shelby Rousseau, stewardship director for Rangeley Lakes Heritage Trust.
The structure’s removal was not an easy decision for the trust.
“This is a sad thing to have to do but we didn’t feel there was any other option,” Rousseau said Friday. “The risks far outweighed the benefits.”
She said the dam was probably built around 1898 and until early last week, the old timbers – looking very much like a covered bridge – stood vigil over the Rapid.
Nobody disputes the aesthetic appeal of the building – poets, painters and photographers have documented its beauty. Anglers have vivid and loving memories of fishing in its shadow.
But a feasibility study to save the aging structure found it would require $300,000 to $500,000 to repair it.
Having acquired the defunct dam about a year ago with conservation land on the Rapid River, the trust was forced to decide what to do with it. It posed several environmental and safety hazards.
The Rapid River, along with adjacent Pond in the River, is prime native brook trout and salmon habitat already threatened by invasive small-mouth bass.
Should the structure collapse, debris floating down the river could injure anglers and change water flow negatively impacting trout and salmon spawning areas. Oil or other contaminants from the dam works could also damage the habitat.
Dave Dominie, an environmental specialist with E/Pro Engineering and Environmental Consulting, worked on the feasibility study and plans for the gatehouse’s removal.
There was a lot to consider – whether the density of the underwater substrate would support large machinery; erosion, silt and sedimentation concerns; oil spills or other fluid leakage from excavation trucks in the water and random debris floating downstream.
Logger, Joe Haley and a crew of five from M & H Logging in Rangeley, representatives from the Department of Inland Fisheries and Wildlife, the Department of Environmental Protection, the trust and others were at the remote site early last week.
“It was very much a cooperative effort (between several agencies and individuals),” Dominie said of the operation Friday.
Haley used a large excavator with a thumb to remove pieces of the gatehouse that he deposited into a large waiting dump truck – about nine truckloads were removed, according to Rousseau who called Haley an artist.
“The (excavator) operator was very skillful,” agreed Dominie who was also there.
A hazardous materials response team from the DEP deployed a boom downstream from the site, as a preventative measure. State biologists and others observed. About a half pick-up truck bed of escaped debris was collected by volunteers who waited downstream to catch it.
Haley said dismantling the dam reminded him of tearing down part of an old family farmhouse in Rangeley – it was kind of the same thing, he said.
“It’s too bad there isn’t a way to save that sort of thing,” he said.
“I can’t explain to you that day,” Rousseau said. “It was very emotional. It was, perhaps, one of the most somber moments of my life. But now our collaborative focus can be on saving the native wild brook trout on the Rapid River,” she added.
Paraphrasing Dave Boucher, a fisheries biologist for IFW, a forum contributor on flyfishinginmaine.com wrote, “It looks different to us, but the fish probably won’t notice much difference.”
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