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BACKROADS • SEPTEMBER 2021
Frontline Eurosports presents
BIG CITY GETAWAY
daytrip ideas to get out of the daily grind
GOD DAM A CLOSE UP LOOK AT SOME OF OUR LOCAL DAMS When I was a young kid riding up from Queens into the northwest part of New Jersey, a place I now call home, I came across a dam. The Wanaque Reservoir is a man-made lake located within Wanaque and Ringwood, New Jersey, along the Wanaque River. The reservoir came into being in 1928 by the construction of the Raymond Dam along the river in Wanaque. It’s been there for decades, but it was the first time I saw it. My discovery. Dams have changed our life. Dams have saved lives. Dams have failed and crushed lives. There are over 84,000 dams in our nation. All holding back … maybe a slight problem. Let’s look at some in the northeast that we can learn a bit about and actually ride to.
FRANCIS E. WALTER DAM • THE LEHIGH RIVER, PA
Prior to the construction of the dam, the Lehigh River was subject to regular massive flooding as a result of large ice dams breaking apart after heavy rain, abruptly releasing all the water built up behind them. The
resulting wave would be as high as 30 feet, destroying anything caught in its path. The most famous flood occurring as a result of this phenomenon was in 1861 when ice and timber caught in the wave destroyed dams and locks on the river, flooding settlements several hundred feet from the river’s normal bounds. Today it is just a stunning water crossing – well unless the weather decides against that.
NEW CROTON DAM • CORTLANDT, NY
The construction began in 1892 and was completed in 1906. Designed by Alphonse Fteley, this masonry is 266 feet broad at its base and 297 feet high from
base to crest. At the time of its completion, it was the tallest dam in the world. It impounds up to 19 billion US gallons of water, a small fraction of the New York City water system’s total storage capacity of 580 billion US gallons. And it’s right in our backyard.
DAM FACT:
Parker Dam is a concrete arch-gravity dam that crosses the Colorado River 155 miles downstream of
Hoover Dam. Built between 1934 and 1938 by the Bureau of Reclamation, it is 320 feet high, 235 feet of which are below the riverbed, making it the deepest dam in the world – and, in our opinion, one of the most interesting style-wise.
