Can the Devon Be Saved?
For
decades the back cover of the college catalog featured
a photograph of a stone bridge crossing the Devon River.
Fund raising brochures and alumni publications often
include pictures of students admiring Devon Falls on
the north side of the campus. The river is as much associated
with the college as Old Main and the hundred-year-old
clock tower.1
The Devon's grassy banks have been popular places for
students to relax, picnic, read, or sunbathe. The Devon
has been one of the college's main draws. Campus visitors
are universally drawn by the sound of water rushing
over massive boulders to the river bank.
Now massive development has come to the Devon River.2
The university has approved construction of a 300 room
dorm along the river, clearing ten across of woodland
for the building and parking lot. Upriver, the county's
largest subdivision, Devoncrest, nears completion. Some
200 condominiums and 450 apartments will be occupied
by next spring.
The surge in population will greatly increase the amount
of sewage flowing into the fifty-seven-year-old treatment
plant at English Beach.3
In addition, new storm sewers will feed more water into
the river, as will runoff from the new parking lots
being built on the banks.4
The Riverwest project on the opposite shore will have
even a greater impact on the Devon. Three high-rise
office towers and a new shopping mall with parking for
800 cars will occupy a half-mile strip of newly cleared
riverbank.
Designed on an incline, the mall parking lots will send
rainwater cascading into the river, eroding the denuded
riverbank. Already mud slides have shorn ten feet off
the edge. In winter tons of snow will likely be plowed
from the new parking lots and dumped into the river.
5
This development will cause the narrow Devon River
to flood in the spring. Five years ago the state erected
a series of levees to protect the marshes from floods
and possible oil spills. These levees protect the bird
sanctuary very effectively, but they limit the marshland's
ability to act like a mammoth sponge, which previously
absorbed much of the spring runoff.
As a result, we can expect flooding as more water enters
the river near the new parking lots. 6
Mud slides will add to the problems. The sewage treatment
plant, located on the flood plain, may be easily overwhelmed
and release raw sewage into the bay.
Sewage spills could contaminate beaches and have a dramatic
effect on fishing, boating, and tourism. The value of
beach property could plummet.7
In
our rush to capitalize on the beauty of our river, we
are threatening the bay, which generates jobs and income.
We must lobby the university and developers to take
steps now to limit runoff from parking lots and to plant
fresh vegetation to prevent further erosion of the riverbanks.
If steps are not taken now, the new condos and office
towers will overlook nothing but a stream of mud and
debris. 8
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