Belleville Lake (Wayne County, Michigan)

Belleville Lake
Belleville Lake seen from Doane's Landing
Location Van Buren Township, Wayne County, Michigan
Coordinates 42°12′43.1″N 83°29′46.7″W / 42.211972°N 83.496306°W / 42.211972; -83.496306
Basin countries United States
Surface area 1,270 acres (5.1 km2)[1]

Belleville Lake is a 2-square-mile man-made lake located in Wayne County in the U.S. state of Michigan. It was created in 1925 by the Eastern Michigan Edison Company, by damming the Huron River. The 28-foot-high dam was the last in a series of five dams along the river, creating electricity from hydropower until 1962.[2] The hydropower plant was refurbished in 1988 and has a nameplate production of 1.7 MW.[3] It contains 17,780 acre-feet of water in the seven-mile-long lake.[4] The small community of Rawsonville was flooded out by the dam.

Belleville Lake is created by the 890-foot-long earthen dam at French Landing.

The lake is used for boating and fishing, although the dam has restricted the passage of some fish species and eliminated a commercial mussel fishery which provided mother of pearl for buttons in the early 1900s[5] A 2002 EPA report listed the water quality as good but algae blooms from phosphorus run-off are a known issue.[6][7]

References

  1. ↑ Belleville Lake survey map, Michigan Department of Natural Resources, updated 1943
  2. ↑ French Landing Dam, historical marker
  3. ↑ Inventory of Power Plants in the United States as of January 1, 1998, United States. Energy Information Administration. Office of Coal, Nuclear, Electric and Alternate Fuels, 1998
  4. ↑ Belleville Lake, Van Buren Township, official website, 2003
  5. ↑ Belleville Lake History Archived March 4, 2013, at the Wayback Machine., Belleville Lake Current, William Zilke, Jul 15 2010
  6. ↑ Assessment Data for Michigan, Huron Watershed, Year 2002, U.S. EPA, Last updated on Thursday, May 24, 2012
  7. ↑ TOTAL MAXIMUM DAILY LOAD FOR PHOSPHORUS IN FORD AND BELLEVILLE LAKES, MICHIGAN DEPARTMENT OF ENVIRONMENTAL QUALITY, WATER DIVISION, SEPTEMBER 2004


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