As published on WYSO - November 11, 2024
Visitors recently toured the Lockington Dam to see what goes into protecting over 1 million people and $10 billion worth of property from floods.
The tour was put on by the Miami Conservancy District, which established the flood protection system in the Miami Valley following a devastating flood in 1913.
During the October event, which was styled after an open house, visitors could go to different stations established around the site to ask questions to MCD staff about their work and the dam and levee system’s operations.
The system consists of
- five dams,
- 55 miles of levees,
- and more than 200 flood gates.
District officials said this system has held back flood waters more than 2,000 times since it was built over 100 years ago.
Lockington Dam is right in between Sidney and Piqua. It's the northernmost dam in the system, meaning it protects structures and communities downstream.
This dam in particular recently underwent some improvements to correct faults in the concrete construction of the dam.
Improvements on this dam from 1999 to 2026 will cost a total of $30 million. The funding comes from the district’s Dam Safety Initiative.
MaryLynn Lodor, general manager for the Miami Conservancy District, said the district wants to show why reinvestment in the system is critical.
“We need to recognize the fact that when we have increased precipitation, increased runoff, that water has to go somewhere. And the Miami Valley residents and businesses of the region have this very remarkable system that manages the flood waters,” Lodor said.
Don O’Conor, chief engineer with MCD, said he wants people to know that the system is working as it should, but it also needs regular maintenance to stay that way.
“We need to continuously invest in it. Any infrastructure like this that our communities are built around needs constant attention to make sure that it's operating the way it should be,” O’Conor said.
Lodor said the conservancy district will be holding tours of its other flood protection infrastructure in the near future.
As for upcoming projects, Lodor said the conservancy district will be completing a risk based analysis of its assets to identify which ones are at the highest risk of failure as well as produce the largest consequences from failure.
