Water disappearing from Ellington lake? - WFSB 3 Connecticut

Water disappearing from Ellington lake?

Residents living near Crystal Lake in Ellington are upset over the fact that water has been disappearing over the last decade.

Neighbors around the lake said they have been watching runoff full of sediment slowly fill the lake in the Aborn Cove area, turning what was once five feet of water into a marshy mess.

When the Lussier family bought their home in 1995, Crystal Lake's Aborn Cove looked very different.

"We had an 18-foot boat that we could take in and off our dock," said Monique Lussier. "People would kayak, canoe, fish and use all sorts of things in front of our home in the cove."

Over the last decade, the cove has slowly filled with sediment, preventing residents from enjoying the lake off their property.

"There's a number of houses, and obviously it affects property values. It affects their enjoyment and use," she said.

Sediment from Abron Road runs into a catch basin that flows in a brook that feeds the lake. The Department of Transportation installed the catch basin after straightening Route 140 a decade ago.

The Lussiers have tried to get the town and the state to take action, and would like to see dredging in the short term and an engineering study to be done to determine a more permanent solution.

But, they're running into dead ends.

The price tag for the study is $10,000.

When Channel 3 Eyewitness News asked Ellington First Selectman Maurice Blanchette if the town had any plans to fix the problem in the future, he said, "I don't know. It sounds like a very large program to do that. I guess long-term would be a dredging project which would be substantial money. So that would have to come from a funding source which is a key to a lot of it."

The DOT said it inspected the area in question last week and said it found the sediment "was not the result of DOT maintenance or construction activity, but rather coming from a private road called Aborn Road, a sandy gravel road with obvious erosion problems."

The DOT said the Homeowners Association should look into paving the road in order to better prevent runoff.

Blanchette said, "It's always a concern. Crystal Like is a valued resource for the town, and obviously this is an area of concern, but the question is, 'What can be done?'"

The Lussiers said they hope something can be done before their natural resource dries up even more.

"Eventually it's going to be land and it will probably fill in to the point out there," said Bill Lussier.

The Lussiers said a huge part of why they chose to settle down near the lake was so their children could enjoy it.

With the situation the way it is, their kids have never been able to swim right off their property.

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