SPRINGFIELD, VA — A Fairfax County task force created to examine the future of Lake Accotink will break into subcommittees to do more in-depth studies on the future of the lake, including the value of preserving Lake Accotink and how a managed wetland approach would work.
The Task Force on the Future of Lake Accotink held its third meeting on Monday at the Fairfax County Government Center. Task Force Chair Sharon Bulova, who previously served as Fairfax County Board chair and Braddock District supervisor, announced that three subcommittees would be created. Lake Accotink is located in Fairfax County’s Braddock District.
At Monday’s meeting, the task force also discussed questions they would like a consultant to explore, including what a managed wetland or smaller lake option could include, look like, require in terms of maintenance, and cost.
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The next meeting of the task force will be held on Monday, Aug. 7 at 7 p.m. at the Fairfax County Government Center. It will include a presentation on the Lake Barcroft Watershed Improvement Project.
Here’s the focus of each of the three proposed subcommittees:
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The task force meetings are open to the public and interested community members are welcome to attend to observe the task force’s work or watch the meeting on Channel 16.
The creation of the task force was approved unanimously by the Fairfax County Board of Supervisors on May 23 at the request of Braddock District Supervisor James Walkinshaw.
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The 55-acre Lake Accotink is a man-made reservoir built by the U.S. Army. The lake, located in the middle of a densely developed 30-square-mile watershed, has been dredged three times — the first time in the 1960s, again in the 1980s, and most recently in 2018 — in order to remove sediment and prevent it from returning to its natural state.
Since 2014, Fairfax County has been exploring ways to address increased sedimentation and preserve Lake Accotink. Fairfax County staff has recommended that Lake Accotink not be dredged and, instead, turned into a wetland due to the cost of dredging.
Dredging Lake Accotink is projected to cost $95 million, and the total cost to dredge and maintain Lake Accotink over the next 25 years would cost $395 million, according to county staff.
At Monday’s meeting, Gail Nittle, president of the Springfield Civic Association, asked about the potential impacts of the planned improvements to Braddock Road by the Virginia Department of Transportation on sediment filling Lake Accotink.
“Braddock Road, as it exists right now, has almost no stormwater management,” Walkinshaw said at Monday’s meeting in response to Nittle’s question.
Part of the community’s focus with regard to VDOT’s Braddock Road Multimodal Improvements Project will be stormwater management. “Right now, Braddock Road is a disaster from an Accotink perspective, and we’re trying to improve that,” Walkinshaw said.
The upgrades that get included in the Braddock Road project, including the building of modern stormwater facilities, could actually benefit the stormwater problems, he said.
RELATED: Lake Accotink Task Force Created To Review Wetland, Hybrid Options
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