Lake LaVerne improvements begin next month

The end of the semester in mid-May will trigger the start of a much-anticipated project to restore and upgrade Lake LaVerne on the south edge of campus.

Final steps to award the contract continue, but construction fences will start to go up soon, said campus planner Chris Strawhacker, real estate and capital planning. He's a member of the planning team that includes staff and faculty as well as landscape architects and engineers from the Shive-Hattery firm. 

The focus in May is to pump the lake water into adjacent College Creek to allow several feet of accumulated soft sediment to dry out as much as possible before it has to be scooped out and moved off site. But even sediment that has been drying for two weeks will contain a lot of moisture, he noted.

The base part of the lake project, draining, dredging and excavating the lake bottom and stabilizing the shoreline, will cost an estimated $2 million, supported with about $1.8 million in university funds. This part of the project includes:

• Modifying the north shoreline to create space for additional seating and an accessible route to the water's edge.
• Adjusting the shoreline in the southeast corner to create space for a hard-surface plaza for use both by visitors to the lake and the campus team that cleans and maintains the lake.

This work should wrap up by November. During a second season of construction (2027), private gifts totaling more than $4 million will enable the university to add an amphitheater on the south lawn of the lake and a pedestrian bridge across its western section. Those features will be designed this summer and bid this fall.

Summer dump truck procession

According to the project timeline, Strawhacker said the dredging work to remove the sediment -- estimated at a thousand dump truck loads -- can begin after May 31. To accommodate this process, parts of two roads adjacent to the lake will close around June 1 for approximately two months.

• On the east side: Morrill Road from Lincoln Way north to the Memorial Union west loop driveway will close (loop driveway will remain accessible from the north). The west entrance to the MU south driveway will be closed, but the Lincoln Way entrance will assure access to the MU parking ramp.
• Along the north side: The eastbound lane of Union Drive will close. To maintain two-way traffic on Union Drive, drivers will be guided to use the westbound lane and the parking lane. Permit holders for Reserved lot 74 will park in other locations during June and July.

When the sediment is gone, Strawhacker said areas of the clay bottom of Lake LaVerne will be excavated to intentionally create varying depths throughout the lake -- as deep as 12 feet in the center, but also depths between 6 inches and 3 feet for aquatic plant shelves, fish spawning beds or a safe shoreline. The average depth of the excavated Lake LaVerne will be 5 feet, he said. Clay excavated from the lake bottom will be used to reshape the north and southeast shorelines, creating space for the seating and plaza areas, respectively.

Into the fall: Lake re-creation

When the lake bottom excavation is complete, implementing the design plan for Lake LaVerne will continue into November. That work will include placing more than 400 tons of large limestone slabs to stabilize the shoreline, constructing the north seating and southeast plaza features, adding aquatic and shoreline plantings (this will continue into spring 2027) and refilling the lake.

A deeper, healthier lake is the goal

Strawhacker said the top priority of the project is to restore the depth and volume of the water in Lake LaVerne to better manage water quality and nutrients. Currently, the deepest parts of the lake are about 5.5 feet, with an average depth of about 2.5 feet.