The faint sound of a pump has returned to Lake Accotink Park in Springfield, as the second spring and summer of dredging began a few weeks ago.
Jim Duncan, a spokesman for the Fairfax County Park Authority, said the silt being taken out of the bottom of the lake is being pumped to an industrial park on Edsall Road, a few miles away, to increase the depth of the once 110-acre lake.
A small island created by silt collected in the middle of the lake will also be modified during the dredging, as silt is relocated there to fill in a small wetlands area on one end of the island, said Charles Smith, a Park Authority naturalist.
"This lake was the water supply for the area before World War II," said Smith. Lake Accotink was originally built in 1919 to be the main water source for Fort Belvoir.
"At that time, we didn't have nearly as much development in the area," he said. Now that houses abound on either side of the park, the area has become prone to flashfloods during heavy rainstorms, which carry with them fast moving water and eroded soil into the lake.
If the lake and dam had not been built, the silt would have traveled farther downstream toward Accotink Bay and eventually the Chesapeake Bay, which would have created more damage in the long run.
Not all of the small island in the middle of the lake has accumulated enough silt for plants to begin to grow there, Smith said, so some of the silt vacuumed up from the bottom of the lake is being dropped in the middle of the island to create a stronger wetland.
"We wanted to solidify the land there, so we're planting some shrubby plants" in the newly silted area, Smith said.
The more established and solidified parts of the island are frequently visited by wildlife that munches on the grass and plants growing there, Smith said.
All the plants being used on the island are native to the area, he added.
WHEN THE DREDGING is completed, the bottom of the lake around the island will be slightly deeper than it is now to further solidify the 3-acre island, Duncan said.
Weather problems have resulted in some delays in this year's dredging work, he said.
"We originally wanted to be done with all this by the end of the fall, but we probably won't be done until next year with the planting and the dredging," Duncan said.
Supervisor Dana Kauffman (D-Lee), whose district shares the lake with Supervisor Sharon Bulova (D-Braddock), said he visits the park often to fish with his son.
"We go every year in the hopes that this will be the year we catch something," Kauffman said. "We have yet to catch a single fish."
Kauffman, who will retire from the Board of Supervisors in December, said the work at Lake Accotink is part of an overall push to preserve parkland in Fairfax County.
"We're trying to grow the number of parks while we still have land in the area and we're also trying to expand the use of the parks we currently own," he said.
With a long list of activities, from miniature golf and a carousel to inclusion on the Cross County Trail and limited fishing opportunities, Kauffman said Lake Accotink Park is among the public’s favorites in Fairfax County.
"Lake Accotink is one area where you can see the cross-section of today's Fairfax County at play with mutual respect," he said. "It's also the place with the most number of speed bumps," he laughed.