Finishing off the new dock is the only work remaining at Huddleston Pond, and barring any weather delays it should be done by Friday, Peachtree City stormwater engineer Mark Caspar told the City Council June 3.

The pond’s dam had to be rebuilt after severe structural problems were detected, and the project lagged in delays in large part due to the bureaucracy in getting state and federal permits, city officials have said.

The problem was with the dam’s spillway pipe, which had been damaged by tree root intrusion. The city ended up having to take all the trees down that were on the older earthen dam, which has led to criticism about the aesthetics of the project, noted City Manager Bernie McMullen.

“We removed the trees from the rest of the dam because it impacts the rest of the structure,” McMullen said.

The project cost $456,000 which was paid for from the city’s stormwater revenues.

Caspar said a similar project will be undertaken by the city’s stormwater program at the Rockspray Pond, which will need a new dam but is not in as bad a shape as Huddleston was previously. It is projected to cost $238,000.

Councilwoman Cyndi Plunkett said the city needed to prepare schematic drawings to show neighbors in the area what the pond will look like afterwards.

Caspar noted that among the many stormwater projects completed or underway, they have been prioritized to handle all structural flooding concerns first.

One of the completed projects is at 531 North Fairfield where a house that habitually flooded was removed and the city created a regional detention pond on the parcel. That cost $164,000.

The city has also spent $175,000 on an assessment of the city’s stormwater system and will be spending $270,000 as part of an ongoing project to map a new floodplain.

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