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Lewisville Lake

February 16, 2024

Lewisville Lake, formerly known as Garza-Little Elm Reservoir, is a reservoir in North Texas (USA) on the Elm Fork of the Trinity River in Denton County near Lewisville. Originally engineered in 1927 as Lake Dallas, the reservoir was expanded in the 1940s and 1950s and renamed Lewisville Lake. It was built for flood control purposes and to serve as a water source for Dallas and its suburbs, but residents also use it for recreational purposes.

Lewisville Lake
Lake Dallas (previously)
Aerial view of Lewisville Lake and Dam
Lewisville Lake
Lewisville Lake
LocationDenton County, Texas
Coordinates33°04′09″N 96°57′52″W / 33.06917°N 96.96444°W / 33.06917; -96.96444
Typereservoir
Primary inflowsElm Fork of the Trinity River
Catchment area325,700 acres (1,318 km2)
Basin countriesUnited States
Managing agencyUnited States Army Corps of Engineers
Built1948 (1948)
First flooded1955 (1955)
Max. length11 mi (18 km)
Max. width4.24 mi (6.82 km)
Surface area29,592 acres (11,975 ha)
Max. depth67 ft (20 m)
Water volume555,000 acre⋅ft (685,000,000 m3)
Surface elevation522 ft (159 m)
Frozen16 February 2021
Islandshas islands and islets
SettlementsLewisville, Texas

History edit

 
The lake as seen from space in 2009

Lewisville Lake is the second lake to impound the waters of the Elm Fork of the Trinity River in this area. The W.E. Callahan Construction Company completed the Garza Dam in 1927 at a cost of $5 million, which created Lake Dallas. The dam was 10,890 feet (3,320 m) long with a 567-foot (173 m) long service spillway. The lake, with its 194,000-acre-foot (239,000,000 m3) capacity and forty-three miles of shoreline, was the principal municipal water source for the city of Dallas for 31 years.

In the 1940s, a need for increased water storage capacity and additional flood control became apparent. The United States Congress passed the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1945, which called for additional construction in the Trinity River basin. The United States Army Corps of Engineers built the Garza-Little Elm Dam between 1948 and 1954 at cost of $23.4 million.[1] The structure combined Lake Dallas, Hickory Creek, and Little Elm Creek. The 32,888-foot (10,024 m) long Lewisville Dam was completed in 1955, and the Garza Dam was breached in 1957 to create the new lake, known then as Garza-Little Elm Reservoir and renamed Lewisville Lake. This new lake had one hundred eighty-three miles of shoreline and a 436,000-acre-foot (538,000,000 m3) capacity.[2] In 1998, additional modifications raised the lake's permanent level from 515 feet MSL to 522 feet MSL and increased the holding capacity to 555,000 acre-feet.[2]

During construction, members of the Corps of Engineers stumbled upon an archaeological site.[3] In 1956, Wilson W. Crook, Jr. and R.K. Harris announced Carbon-14(14C) testing on artifacts from the site, including a Paleo-Indian Clovis projectile point, indicated humans had lived there c. 36,000 BP.[4][5] This led to much controversy in the archaeological community.[6][7] It was not until 1978 the water levels would recede enough to access the site again. Between 1978 and 1980, Dennis Stanford of the Smithsonian Institution performed a thorough analysis of the site. He concluded the original dating was due to a rare form of cross-contamination and a date of c. 12,000 B.P. was more correct.[8][9] Still, the site is considered one of the earliest inhabited by humans in the Southwestern United States and Mexico.[10]

The breaching of the Garza Dam and incorporation of Lake Dallas into the Garza-Little Elm reservoir led to confusion concerning the lake's legal name. This was compounded by the Village of Garza renaming itself Lake Dallas. The federal government attempted to rename the lake as Lewisville Reservoir in 1960, only to reverse itself in 1961. The confusion persisted until the mid-1970s when the lake was officially designated Lewisville Lake. In 1991, the City of Denton (which operates its own municipal power grid) installed a hydropower facility at Lewisville Dam. The single horizontal S-Shaped Kaplan unit can produce 2893 kilowatts, and is connected to the grid via the Brazos River Distribution Authority.

Valentines Day weekend 2021 North Texas and much of the South East United States was hit by a polar vortex plunging temperatures in the DFW area to record lows in nearly 100 years with wind chills in the negative teens. On Tuesday 16 February 2021 large parts of the lake were frozen over. Local measurements taken in Little Elm recorded 2" thick ice at 150 ft from shore with water depth approximately 11 ft. Closer to shore ice exceeded 5". Lewisville Lake had never frozen prior to 2021, since the Garza-Little Elm dam being breached in 1957 to create the current Lewisville Lake.[citation needed]

Recreation edit

The lake is in the Dallas/Fort Worth Metroplex, so during the summer months, it can become extremely crowded. There are six marinas and three restaurants on the lake. Recreational boating is popular with boat tours and charters available from area businesses. Visitors looking for a more rowdy scene like to visit Party Cove. Centrally located on the lake, near Westlake Park, is the place where boats tie up to one another, listen to music and consume alcoholic beverages.[11] In 2005, at the first large scale bass fishing tournament at Lewisville Lake, Kevin VanDam took home 1st place and a check for $100,000. He also caught, at the time, the lake record bass at 11 pounds 13 ounces (5.4 kg).[12] The Woman's Bassmaster Tour's inaugural event was held in October 2005. The Tour returned in May 2006 and again in April 2008, with angler Kim Bain winning, taking home $51,000 in cash and prizes.[13]

Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area (LLELA) is a 2,600-acre nature preserve that is adjacent to the lake. It is used for hiking, camping, and other recreational activities.[14]

Concerns edit

Lake Lewisville's dam has been a recent and occurring issue as it has been "crumbling," narrowly avoiding failure.[15][16] The dam holds an estimated 180 billion gallons of water, and its aging system, embankment, and support system has struggled to maintain its capacity. The dam has had close calls, such as a sand-boil in 2015, which caused alarm. The U.S. Army Corps of Engineers approved a $150 million repair and upgrade project in 2017. Work to reduce risks of dam failure from seepage was completed in August 2021. Work started in 2021 on a four-year project to upgrade the spillway.[17]

Transportation edit

Nine bridges cross the lake:

  • The main bridge on Interstate 35E crosses the lake on its western finger and is a notorious traffic bottleneck during rush hour. The 35Express project will increase the number of free lanes from 3 to 4 in each direction, and add a managed-toll lane in each direction.[18]
  • In parallel with the I-35E bridge is a railroad bridge carrying the DCTA's A-Train.
  • Another regularly used bridge is on the lake's eastern finger through Little Elm, connecting two halves of Farm to Market Road 720, locally known as Eldorado Parkway. It carries most of the traffic from communities east of the lake to the Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge.
  • US 380 crosses the extreme northern end in two places, each requiring a short bridge. To the west it crosses the Elm Fork, the lake's primary inlet. To the east it crosses the inlet at Pecan Creek.
  • The Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge, opened on August 1, 2009, is a NTTA toll bridge connecting Little Elm via Eldorado Parkway and Interstate 35E near Swisher Road. It is to the north of the original Garza Dam.
  • Two bridges, part of a northern extension of Farm to Market Road 2499, opened in 2011 and cross the lake's extreme western ends at the Bryant Branch and the Poindexter Branch.
  • On the east side of the lake, F.M. 423 crosses the lake via a short bridge at the Stewart's Creek inlet.

Highland Village/Lewisville Lake Station is a commuter rail stop on the DCTA A-train. It connects downtown Denton with DART's Green Line in Carrollton.

See also edit

Notes edit

  1. ^ Cole-Jett 2011, p. 99.
  2. ^ a b Corps 2007.
  3. ^ Bloom 1979, p. 96.
  4. ^ Crook & Harris 1957, p. 68-70.
  5. ^ Crook & Harris 1958, p. 1.
  6. ^ Bloom 1979, p. 94.
  7. ^ Heizer & Brooks 1965, p. 155.
  8. ^ Dixon 1999, p. 83-84.
  9. ^ Stanford 1982, pp. 208–209.
  10. ^ Menchaca 2001, p. 27.
  11. ^ "An RV or Boat Owner's Guide to Lake Lewisville". Teasley Lane Self Storage.
  12. ^ Whitley & Kendall 2005.
  13. ^ Communications 2008.
  14. ^ "Guided Recreation at LLELA | Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area". www.llela.org. Retrieved 2022-05-19.
  15. ^ Nicholson, Eric. "Lewisville Dam: Just One of America's Many Pieces of Crumbling Infrastructure". Dallas Observer. Retrieved 2022-12-16.
  16. ^ Celeste, Eric (2015-12-16). "Questions for the DMN on that Lewisville Dam Story". D Magazine. Retrieved 2022-12-16.
  17. ^ [url=https://www.swf.usace.army.mil/Media/News-Releases/Article/3043804/usace-announces-761m-construction-contract-for-lewisville-lake-spillway-repairs/#:~:text=The%20%24150%20million%20Lewisville%20Dam,%2C%20recreation%2C%20and%20environmental%20stewardship.]
  18. ^ Texas Department of Transportation. "The 35Express Project".

References edit

External links edit

  • 1940 Map of Lake Dallas
  • US Army Corps of Engineers
  • Lewisville Lake from the Handbook of Texas Online
  • Texas Parks and Wildlife Lake Info
  • U.S. Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System: Lewisville Lake

February 16, 2024
lewisville, lake, formerly, known, garza, little, reservoir, reservoir, north, texas, fork, trinity, river, denton, county, near, lewisville, originally, engineered, 1927, lake, dallas, reservoir, expanded, 1940s, 1950s, renamed, built, flood, control, purpose. Lewisville Lake formerly known as Garza Little Elm Reservoir is a reservoir in North Texas USA on the Elm Fork of the Trinity River in Denton County near Lewisville Originally engineered in 1927 as Lake Dallas the reservoir was expanded in the 1940s and 1950s and renamed Lewisville Lake It was built for flood control purposes and to serve as a water source for Dallas and its suburbs but residents also use it for recreational purposes Lewisville LakeLake Dallas previously Aerial view of Lewisville Lake and DamLewisville LakeShow map of TexasLewisville LakeShow map of the United StatesLocationDenton County TexasCoordinates33 04 09 N 96 57 52 W 33 06917 N 96 96444 W 33 06917 96 96444TypereservoirPrimary inflowsElm Fork of the Trinity RiverCatchment area325 700 acres 1 318 km2 Basin countriesUnited StatesManaging agencyUnited States Army Corps of EngineersBuilt1948 1948 First flooded1955 1955 Max length11 mi 18 km Max width4 24 mi 6 82 km Surface area29 592 acres 11 975 ha Max depth67 ft 20 m Water volume555 000 acre ft 685 000 000 m3 Surface elevation522 ft 159 m Frozen16 February 2021Islandshas islands and isletsSettlementsLewisville Texas Contents 1 History 2 Recreation 3 Concerns 4 Transportation 5 See also 6 Notes 7 References 8 External linksHistory edit nbsp The lake as seen from space in 2009Lewisville Lake is the second lake to impound the waters of the Elm Fork of the Trinity River in this area The W E Callahan Construction Company completed the Garza Dam in 1927 at a cost of 5 million which created Lake Dallas The dam was 10 890 feet 3 320 m long with a 567 foot 173 m long service spillway The lake with its 194 000 acre foot 239 000 000 m3 capacity and forty three miles of shoreline was the principal municipal water source for the city of Dallas for 31 years In the 1940s a need for increased water storage capacity and additional flood control became apparent The United States Congress passed the Rivers and Harbors Act of 1945 which called for additional construction in the Trinity River basin The United States Army Corps of Engineers built the Garza Little Elm Dam between 1948 and 1954 at cost of 23 4 million 1 The structure combined Lake Dallas Hickory Creek and Little Elm Creek The 32 888 foot 10 024 m long Lewisville Dam was completed in 1955 and the Garza Dam was breached in 1957 to create the new lake known then as Garza Little Elm Reservoir and renamed Lewisville Lake This new lake had one hundred eighty three miles of shoreline and a 436 000 acre foot 538 000 000 m3 capacity 2 In 1998 additional modifications raised the lake s permanent level from 515 feet MSL to 522 feet MSL and increased the holding capacity to 555 000 acre feet 2 During construction members of the Corps of Engineers stumbled upon an archaeological site 3 In 1956 Wilson W Crook Jr and R K Harris announced Carbon 14 14C testing on artifacts from the site including a Paleo Indian Clovis projectile point indicated humans had lived there c 36 000 BP 4 5 This led to much controversy in the archaeological community 6 7 It was not until 1978 the water levels would recede enough to access the site again Between 1978 and 1980 Dennis Stanford of the Smithsonian Institution performed a thorough analysis of the site He concluded the original dating was due to a rare form of cross contamination and a date of c 12 000 B P was more correct 8 9 Still the site is considered one of the earliest inhabited by humans in the Southwestern United States and Mexico 10 The breaching of the Garza Dam and incorporation of Lake Dallas into the Garza Little Elm reservoir led to confusion concerning the lake s legal name This was compounded by the Village of Garza renaming itself Lake Dallas The federal government attempted to rename the lake as Lewisville Reservoir in 1960 only to reverse itself in 1961 The confusion persisted until the mid 1970s when the lake was officially designated Lewisville Lake In 1991 the City of Denton which operates its own municipal power grid installed a hydropower facility at Lewisville Dam The single horizontal S Shaped Kaplan unit can produce 2893 kilowatts and is connected to the grid via the Brazos River Distribution Authority Valentines Day weekend 2021 North Texas and much of the South East United States was hit by a polar vortex plunging temperatures in the DFW area to record lows in nearly 100 years with wind chills in the negative teens On Tuesday 16 February 2021 large parts of the lake were frozen over Local measurements taken in Little Elm recorded 2 thick ice at 150 ft from shore with water depth approximately 11 ft Closer to shore ice exceeded 5 Lewisville Lake had never frozen prior to 2021 since the Garza Little Elm dam being breached in 1957 to create the current Lewisville Lake citation needed Recreation editThe lake is in the Dallas Fort Worth Metroplex so during the summer months it can become extremely crowded There are six marinas and three restaurants on the lake Recreational boating is popular with boat tours and charters available from area businesses Visitors looking for a more rowdy scene like to visit Party Cove Centrally located on the lake near Westlake Park is the place where boats tie up to one another listen to music and consume alcoholic beverages 11 In 2005 at the first large scale bass fishing tournament at Lewisville Lake Kevin VanDam took home 1st place and a check for 100 000 He also caught at the time the lake record bass at 11 pounds 13 ounces 5 4 kg 12 The Woman s Bassmaster Tour s inaugural event was held in October 2005 The Tour returned in May 2006 and again in April 2008 with angler Kim Bain winning taking home 51 000 in cash and prizes 13 Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area LLELA is a 2 600 acre nature preserve that is adjacent to the lake It is used for hiking camping and other recreational activities 14 Concerns editLake Lewisville s dam has been a recent and occurring issue as it has been crumbling narrowly avoiding failure 15 16 The dam holds an estimated 180 billion gallons of water and its aging system embankment and support system has struggled to maintain its capacity The dam has had close calls such as a sand boil in 2015 which caused alarm The U S Army Corps of Engineers approved a 150 million repair and upgrade project in 2017 Work to reduce risks of dam failure from seepage was completed in August 2021 Work started in 2021 on a four year project to upgrade the spillway 17 Transportation editNine bridges cross the lake The main bridge on Interstate 35E crosses the lake on its western finger and is a notorious traffic bottleneck during rush hour The 35Express project will increase the number of free lanes from 3 to 4 in each direction and add a managed toll lane in each direction 18 In parallel with the I 35E bridge is a railroad bridge carrying the DCTA s A Train Another regularly used bridge is on the lake s eastern finger through Little Elm connecting two halves of Farm to Market Road 720 locally known as Eldorado Parkway It carries most of the traffic from communities east of the lake to the Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge US 380 crosses the extreme northern end in two places each requiring a short bridge To the west it crosses the Elm Fork the lake s primary inlet To the east it crosses the inlet at Pecan Creek The Lewisville Lake Toll Bridge opened on August 1 2009 is a NTTA toll bridge connecting Little Elm via Eldorado Parkway and Interstate 35E near Swisher Road It is to the north of the original Garza Dam Two bridges part of a northern extension of Farm to Market Road 2499 opened in 2011 and cross the lake s extreme western ends at the Bryant Branch and the Poindexter Branch On the east side of the lake F M 423 crosses the lake via a short bridge at the Stewart s Creek inlet Highland Village Lewisville Lake Station is a commuter rail stop on the DCTA A train It connects downtown Denton with DART s Green Line in Carrollton See also editGrapevine Lake Trinity River AuthorityNotes edit Cole Jett 2011 p 99 a b Corps 2007 Bloom 1979 p 96 Crook amp Harris 1957 p 68 70 Crook amp Harris 1958 p 1 Bloom 1979 p 94 Heizer amp Brooks 1965 p 155 Dixon 1999 p 83 84 Stanford 1982 pp 208 209 Menchaca 2001 p 27 An RV or Boat Owner s Guide to Lake Lewisville Teasley Lane Self Storage Whitley amp Kendall 2005 Communications 2008 Guided Recreation at LLELA Lewisville Lake Environmental Learning Area www llela org Retrieved 2022 05 19 Nicholson Eric Lewisville Dam Just One of America s Many Pieces of Crumbling Infrastructure Dallas Observer Retrieved 2022 12 16 Celeste Eric 2015 12 16 Questions for the DMN on that Lewisville Dam Story D Magazine Retrieved 2022 12 16 url https www swf usace army mil Media News Releases Article 3043804 usace announces 761m construction contract for lewisville lake spillway repairs text The 20 24150 20million 20Lewisville 20Dam 2C 20recreation 2C 20and 20environmental 20stewardship Texas Department of Transportation The 35Express Project References editBloom John May 1979 Broyles William Jr ed The Dallas Man Texas Monthly Indianapolis Indiana Emmis Communications 7 5 84 85 Retrieved 2011 09 24 Cole Jett Robin 2011 Farmers on the Water Lake Lewisville Lewisville Images of America Charleston South Carolina Arcadia Publishing ISBN 978 0 7385 7993 1 LCCN 2010940829 OCLC 692275589 Retrieved 2012 04 08 Communications Bass 2008 04 15 Alabaster s Kim Bain pulls off upset at first Women s Bassmaster Tour event Shelby County Reporter Retrieved 2012 04 08 History of Lewisville Lake United States Army Corps of Engineers 2007 05 03 Crook Wilson Harris R K 1957 Hearths and Artifacts of Early Man Near Lewisville TX Journal of the Texas Archaeological Society Texas Archaeological Society 7 97 Crook Wilson Harris R K January 1958 A Pleistocene Campsite Near Lewisville Texas American Antiquity Society for American Archaeology XXIII 3 233 246 doi 10 2307 276304 ISSN 0002 7316 JSTOR 276304 S2CID 161227132 Dixon James 1999 Chapter 3 North America s Oldest Sites Bones Boats amp Bison Archeology and the First Colonization of Western North America University of New Mexico University of New Mexico Press pp 45 90 ISBN 978 0 8263 2138 1 LCCN 99041913 Retrieved 2011 09 24 Heizer Robert Brooks Richard May 1965 Lewisville Ancient Campsite or Wood Rat Houses Southwestern Journal of Anthropology University of New Mexico 21 2 155 165 doi 10 1086 soutjanth 21 2 3629390 ISSN 0038 4801 JSTOR 3629390 S2CID 131135806 Menchaca Martha 2001 1 Racial Foundations Recovering History Constructing Race The Indian Black and White roots of Mexican Americans Austin Texas University of Texas Press ISBN 978 0 292 75254 2 Retrieved 2011 09 23 Stanford Dennis 1982 09 14 Ubelaker Douglas Viola Herman eds A critical review of archaeological evidence relating to the antiquity of human occupation of the New World PDF Smithsonian Contributions to Anthropology Washington D C Smithsonian Institution 30 202 218 ISSN 0081 0223 Retrieved 2011 11 03 The Dallas Man Texas Monthly Vol 7 no 5 May 1979 p 94 Whitley Larry Kendall Jenna 2005 06 07 Kevin VanDam Wins Lewisville and Breaks Lake Record Press release Retrieved 2012 04 08 Texas Department of Transportation The 35Express Project External links edit1940 Map of Lake Dallas US Army Corps of Engineers Lewisville Lake from the Handbook of Texas Online Texas Parks and Wildlife Lake Info U S Geological Survey Geographic Names Information System Lewisville Lake Retrieved from https en wikipedia org w index php title Lewisville Lake amp oldid 1191486055, wikipedia, wiki, book, books, library,

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