Improvement planned for Millstone Lake Road
</element><element id="paragraph-1" type="body"><![CDATA[Millstone Lake may again be accessible by car by the summer's end.
The lake, also called Bay Lake and Bay Creek No. 5, in Pope County was already difficult to access in any vehicle that did not have four-wheel drive capabilities. Then the road and parking area suffered more damage in the March 2008 flood. The 10- to 12-inch rain caused the lake water to overwhelm the emergency spillway, ruining the parking area and leaving behind strange eroded sandstone towers.
There is not money to replace the emergency spillway, but Bay Creek Conservancy District Chairman Grover Webb said the district is in talks with a contractor to improve the road.
"We hope to start in the next three weeks to a month," Webb said.
The work will require the contractor to rent a machine called a pounder that will break up rock. Webb said the machine is expensive to rent and the contractor hopes to use it for a couple of jobs together to save on having to rent it twice.
The work may involve blasting of a sheer walls of rock into boulders and using concrete to hold rock in place.
Webb said the levee is not in jeopardy. The emergency spillway which is designed to relieve pressure on the levee will simply run with water if the lake rises.
"There is no danger of anything collapsing or the lake draining," Webb said.
Unless money comes available to fix the eroded area of the emergency spillway, the strange rock formations may add to the charm of the lake.
"We'll have our own little Garden of the Gods," Webb said.
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DeNeal receives e-mail at mailto:bdeneal@yourclearwave.com?subject=MillstoneLake.</li>
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