i cannot believe the DAM(s) faled in MI.

[flatbutt]

Owners may want to remind their administrators that when the lakes get drained property values go down and tax revenue can go down along with them.

[john70t]

Originally Posted by RWebb

Infrastructure matters, even if maintenance is not sexy

It's too bad so much money has already been spent elsewhere.
(see you in barf)

[daepp]

Originally Posted by CurtEgerer

https://www.mlive.com/news/2020/05/owner-of-failed-dam-state-fought-over-wixom-lake-levels-before-flood.html

"In April, Boyce and the state sued each other in state and federal court over the company’s attempts to lower Wixom Lake, an impoundment reservoir that the Michigan Department of Environment said is home to endangered freshwater mussels that were killed by drawdowns in 2018 and 2019."

"Endangered freshwater mussels" - hmm - reminds me of all the lame species Sacramento has used to pursue a political agenda.

In MI, what do you want to bet someone with lake/river front properties paid an environmentalist to make those claims about the muscles? And then spoke to the governor...?

[CurtEgerer]

I entirely forgot about the Fiero Museum in Sanford. The little village of Sanford is basically wiped out, including the 'museum'. It was housed in an old commercial garage. I had noticed all the Fieros parked around the building, but nobody was ever there. Then about 10-15 years ago, I was on an early Sunday AM drive in the 911 and saw a guy there so I stopped. Turns out it was a retired architect I knew of from the business world and he took me on a little tour. The entire inside of this place was crammed with cars, parts, books, memorabilia. He bought out much of the remaining parts inventory from Pontiac and has NOS everything. There were never-driven cars in there and spare engine, etc. It's all been destroyed.

[Scott Douglas]

Originally Posted by CurtEgerer

I entirely forgot about the Fiero Museum in Sanford. The little village of Sanford is basically wiped out, including the 'museum'. It was housed in an old commercial garage. I had noticed all the Fieros parked around the building, but nobody was ever there. Then about 10-15 years ago, I was on an early Sunday AM drive in the 911 and saw a guy there so I stopped. Turns out it was a retired architect I knew of from the business world and he took me on a little tour. The entire inside of this place was crammed with cars, parts, books, memorabilia. He bought out much of the remaining parts inventory from Pontiac and has NOS everything. There were never-driven cars in there and spare engine, etc. It's all been destroyed.

That is a damn shame. It's part of auto history that is gone forever now.

[berettafan]

oh wow, that stinks. Would've been cool to check that place out.

[CurtEgerer]

There were Fieros scattered about town when the water went down. They tried to move some to high ground but while doing so, the dam broke and they're lucky to have escaped with their lives. The guy who owned it suffered a stroke a few years ago and was trying to sell off the collection.

That red one floating must be a one-off. I recall he had a couple of those. And look at the water mark on the roof of the house in that one pic

[RWebb]

sad, but I guess it isn't as bad as rare Corvettes down a sink hole

[CurtEgerer]

[CurtEgerer]

So now the lawsuits are starting to fly. Morgan & Morgan (call #LAW!!!) have a class action already. But what is absolutely mind-boggling were the lawsuits between the owner and the State in the months and days leading up to the disaster. In what must be a first in the history of role reversals, the dam owner was suing the State to essentially acknowledge the fact that his dam was defective and dangerous and the State was suing him essentially saying 'your dam is fine and you must maintain a full water level.' What kind of bizzaro world crap is that?

[CurtEgerer]

More lawsuit fun. Now a group of home owners is suing the State of Michigan (EGLE). The State has been busy since the failure informing all who will listen that this proves that dams should not be privately owned. That may or may not be true for many reasons, but the ultimate responsibility for the dam's safety is with the State. They regulate it. They issue standards for construction and operation. They have the ability to shut it down completely (with use of lethal force and imprisonment of the owners if needed). No different than a privately-owned high-rise building that is substandard and endangers the lives and properties of all those around it.

[vash]

that sucks. ironic that the Fiero cars, well, they were not "forever"

[Crowbob]

How does one shut down a dam?

Speaking of shut downs, The Gretch was asked at a news conference this afternoon if her husband actually tried to take cuts at the boat storage place so he could get his in the water before Memorial Day weekend in front of everybody else in line because he was the governor’s husband.

She said it was his bad attempt at a joke.

Ha.

Ha.

[RWebb]

Hundreds of dams have been removed in the western states.

AFAIK, they don't dredge, just divert for a while then knock the thing down, then put the flow channel back.

There is a bunch of stuff on the dam removed from Olympic Nat'l Park online. It even rebuilt its old delta far downstream.

[Crowbob]

Can you imagine how it would have felt one recent and very fine Memorial Day morning to look out the picture window of your multimillion-dollar lakefront home and see...dirt?

[gordner]

Probably not great, but far short of how bad it was very recently to wake up in your dt apt and look out the window to see you're in a lake.

[Crowbob]

Somebody else probably owns the apartment, though.

A few years after abuncha Lakefront Liberals were screaming at the government to ‘DO SOMETHING!’ because the Great Lakes were drying up are now screaming at the government to ‘DO SOMETHING!’ because their VERY EXPENSIVE lakefront homes are now falling in the water because the lakes are at record levels.

I was at a big important meeting a few years back the first time the Lakefront Liberals we’re crying so I asked the Army Corpse of Engineers guy and the head honcho Federal Great Lakes Hydrologist
Expert what they could do about it?

The room went silent when they both looked at me and said, ‘Not a damn thing until we raise your property taxes to pay for it.’

Oops. Wrong question.

[CurtEgerer]

One thing I learned investigating structural damage along the Great Lakes in MI, is every time the water level is high or low, the apocalypse is upon us. And then 5 years later, it's the opposite.

Re: how does the State shut down a dam? You either remove it or modify it so it doesn't impound water anymore and it returns (in this case) to it's pre-1915 natural river valley. But no more lake. Drastic? Yes. But look at the results of not doing it.

The property owners had the beginnings of a plan put together to fix the dam funded by property tax assessments. But the work didn't start until 2 years from now. The State should've emptied the lake and modified the dam to allow natural flow until the repairs were made. No different than the State requiring installation of temporary shoring and bracing to prevent a dilapidated building from collapsing and causing damage to surrounding properties.

[Crowbob]

So the state is a defendant in a lawsuit claiming the state was negligent in allowing the damn to continue over the objections of the owner/administrators who had shown it to be defective and that it was going to fail. The owners lowered the level out of caution but the state ordered it to raise the levels back up to save a clam (no, not money, a real clam).

So Governor Whitmer decides to have the state investigate what went wrong and who messed up. When called on the obvious conflict, Whitmer says she is going by the usual protocols as if there had never been a lawsuit. In response to which I see abuncha ????’s

https://www.freep.com/story/news/local/michigan/2020/05/27/whitmer-midland-dam-failures-egle-conflicts/5265322002/

Something ain’t right with this woman from Michigan.