Demolition of dam to begin Wednesday

9/13/2017
BLADE STAFF
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    The Ballville Dam in Fremont.

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    • FREMONT — The once-controversial demolition of the Sandusky River’s Ballville Dam is scheduled to start Wednesday morning.

    Chris Daniels, proprietor of Great Lakes Demolition, said the firm will start work around sunrise by cutting a notch in the dam that will allow river water to flow through. The notch will take several hours to cut, he said.

    The Sierra Club’s Ohio chapter had opposed the demolition on the grounds that removing the dam would stir up potentially damaging sediment behind it and cause that material to flow downstream into Sandusky Bay and Lake Erie.

    The environmental group wanted the sediment dug out before the dam’s removal. But it dropped a lawsuit in May, stating that conditions imposed in an Army Corps of Engineers permit for the demolition reduced the pollution hazard.