Other Voices: May be 'winter of discontent' for Royal Gorge

Back before Lakes Serena and Dulzura at Donner Summit were a twinkle in an early subdivider/developer's eye, they wore the much more prosaic name of Ice Lakes. True to form, every winter they obligingly iced over. For a brief time, a commercial ice-harvesting operation was carried out on the Ice Lakes. These lakes still freeze pretty solid. In colder years, before heavy snowfalls, they support ice skating and winter frolicking - think of a picture painted by Brueghel or a Currier and Ives print.

How solid do Serena and Dulzura freeze? This year, the Sierra Lakes County Water District directed employees to study the depth of freeze, and recent ice core samples have shown that at the channel between the lakes, it's frozen solid. The channel is 41Ú2 feet deep, so that's 41Ú2 feet of hard, solid ice. The channel at the dam is frozen the same amount. Samples taken in the middle of the lake show the same 40 to 50 inches of ice thickness.

What does this mean for a winter's water supply at Serene Lakes? Well, the water intake pipe's top is at a depth of 7 feet. Subtract 41Ú2 feet from 7 feet, and that leaves only 21Ú2 feet of available water - approximately 50 acre-feet (AF). Now, mind you, where the lakes are deeper, there's probably a slight difference in the thickness of the ice, so maybe there's actually around 75 AF or so of water.

During the icy months of December, January, February and March. SLCWD uses a total of 36 AF, leaving a small reserve of 39 AF below the ice. Royal Gorge LLC would need 48 AF for each of those four months for its proposed development, since it should be expecting full occupancy through the ski season. Where will they get that much water?

It is indeed starting to look like the "winter of discontent" for Royal Gorge, as it turns out water up on Donner Summit is even scarcer in the winter months than it is in the summer months. This is one time when Royal Gorge actually might be wanting to "skate on thin ice."

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Kathryn Gray lives in Serene Lakes and likes to ice skate on thick ice.