Sandy Springs Takes Another Step To Repair Lake Forrest Dam

Sign up for the Sandy Springs Patch newsletter!

---

The Sandy Springs City Council at its June 16 meeting approved an intergovernmental agreement with the city of Atlanta to move forward with making repairs to the Lake Forrest Dam.

The 60-year-old dam, reclassified by the Environmental Protection Division of the Georgia Department of Natural Resources as a Category I Dam, has been identified with several deficiencies impacting its structural integrity.

Roughly one-half of Lake Forrest Drive, a public road that crosses over the top of the dam, lies within the Atlanta city limits, with the remaining one-half residing within Sandy Springs.

• RELATED: Sandy Springs To Drain Lake Forrest Dam

As part of the agreement, the two cities shall share jointly in addressing and implementing improvements, repairs and/or alterations or other long-term options to bring the dam into compliance with the Safe Dams Act, including associated costs.

The project will be divided into two phases. The first phase consists of lowering the level of the large lake connected to the dam to eliminate any immediate risks to the impact area due to a potential failure and to enable necessary testing and technical evaluation.

A project plan for phase two will be developed once the lake is drained and engineers are able to best evaluate and develop suggested repairs with those recommendations presented and approved by both cities.

Lake Forrest Dam is located near the 4600 block of Lake Forrest Drive.

Pursuant to the Safe Dams Act, the Environmental Protection Division in July 2009 reclassified the Lake Forrest Dam from a Category II Dam to a Category I Dam due to a finding of probable loss of human life if it should fail.

The cities of Atlanta and Sandy Springs agreed to jointly share the responsibility of addressing the dam’s deficiencies in light of the risk for harm to human life and property.

----

Image via Shutterstock