State To Deal With Erosion In Parkville Neighborhood

The Maryland State Highway Administration is planning to undertake a $500,000 to $1 million project to fix a serious erosion issue in a Parkville neighborhood beginning in the summer of 2013.

David Peake, the state agency's engineer for District 4—which includes Baltimore and Harford Counties—said that a team of engineers has evaluated the situation in the Double Rock Lane townhome community that backs up to the Baltimore Belway and decided to move forward with the project.

"We’ve had an erosion problem there right off the Beltway ... if you’re heading on the inner loop, the off ramp to go southbound on Belair Road—there’s a townhome community there: Double Rock," Peake said. "Engineers have looked at the erosion and decided we need a project to go in and build a wall to reinforce the existing bank [of a stream that runs between the highway and the neighborhood.]"

The project, which will be carried out in two phases, has been funded for construction, according to Peake. He estimated that construction would begin in September or August of 2013.

"It's basically going to be a wall—an inbricated stone wall, just used to armor the stream bank and prevent further erosion," Peake said. "It happens. We have streams that tend to move around and erode in different areas. We want to restore it to where it was before."

Although the erosion problem is serious enough to warrant a project to solve it, Peake said that neither the townhomes nor Beltway are currently in any danger as a result.

"Obviously we want to be proactive and we don’t want to wait until a failure does occur," Peake said. "So we’re being proactive and that's the bottom line."

That information was presented to the Double Rock Association at a meeting Monday night.

James Crayton, a homeowner who has lived on Double Rock Lane for 14 years, said he first noticed the issue of erosion 6 or 7 years ago when saw that a fence had fallen into a stream.

Crayton and the association worked with local officials—Del. Joe Boteler, Del. John Cluster and Sen. Kathy Klausmeier—to remedy the situation, he said.

"Thanks to Kathy, she worked with the state and her aide Renee [Smith] would keep emailing me back and forth. They really hopped on it," he said.

The Monday night meeting between the state agency and the townhome community was organized by Klausmeier.

"State Highways has explained to me about phase one and phase two and I appreciate their input," Klausmeier said. "I wanted them to speak to the community firsthand so the community would get the whole picture. That’s why I thought it was important that they meet with the folks from Double Rock."

"I wanted to stay on top of it to make sure it gets done," she said.