For over a decade, the breakwater at McPhee Reservoir, north of Dolores, has been in dire need of some attention.
The structure installed to prevent waves from interfering with operations at the boat ramp consisted of roughly 200 oversize tires strung together with cables. The remnants of a previous breakwater – also a pile of car tires – lay stuck in the lake bed, exposed by dropping water levels.
But after years of waiting, the trash was removed and an 800-foot shiny new wave attenuator was installed in 2023, thanks to a federal grant and the work of the San Juan National Forest, which manages recreation at the site.
The new breakwater, like the one at Lake Nighthorse, is a Wave Eater system composed of floating cylindrical drums that cause surface waves to break and dissipate.
The total cost of the installation and removal of trash exceeded $600,000.
In 2015, Montezuma County spent over $150,000 of a Colorado Parks and Wildlife grant to build a new breakwater. But the design was lacking, said Tom Rice, recreation staff officer of the Dolores Ranger District.
“Over subsequent years, we spent a lot of time repairing it, funneling additional money into it to maintain it,” he said. “It was just a headache to operate because the design just wasn’t a long-term solution.”
The chain of tires would break from time to time, as the reservoir’s levels rose and dipped each year, straining the cables. An old breakwater, which had surrounded a marina, was destroyed in 2004 when the complex burned down.
Bankrupt, the owners left, leaving the mess of cables and 190 car tires to the national forest and its taxpayer backers.
Although the tires were not a pollutant, Rice said the trash heap was “a hazard and an eyesore.”
In 2018, Rice told The Journal that removing the mess was financially infeasible.
However, the SJNF received a grant from the Great American Outdoors Act, a 2020 bill allocating $1.9 billion to fund, among other things, maintenance backlogs on federally managed lands.
The removal of the abandoned trash alone cost an estimated $20,000, according to Rice.
The new breakwater is made of durable yellow and orange polypropylene drums, which, when combined with new, lighted no wake buoys, greatly improve visibility in all weather conditions, day or night, a SJNF spokeswoman said in an email.
Although work was completed in December, Rice said the contractors may have to make some adjustments in the next year.
rschafir@durangoherald.com
