Pond Dredging Expected in Spring

The Conservation Commission has approved two dredging projects at Tedesco golf course, flood-control work intended to improve drainage.

The commission approved dredging a pond by the 11th hole and a smaller pond on the other side of Salem Street, by the 8th hole's tee, said Public Works Director Gino Cresta, who is also a Conservation Commission member.

Tedesco will finance the dredging of the smaller pond, and is expected to use the same contractor the town chooses for dredging the larger pond, he said.

The flood protection is intended for Vinnin businesses and nearby residents including those who belong to the Hawthorne Brook Neighborhood Association.

The town project will go out to bid in the next week or so with work expected within 30 days of the bid award, Cresta said.

Work should be completed within 90 days of its start.

The pond by the 11th hole was designed to  help control flooding, but it has filled with vegetation and sedimentation and is operating at less than half, perhaps as low as 35 percent, of capacity, according to an environmental study by Rimmer Environmental and McKenzie Engineering.

"The pond is part of the stormwater drainage system for much of the central and northern sections of Swampscott as well as the portion of southern Salem near Loring Tower," states the Watershed Evaluation Report for the Tedesco Country Club Pond Watershed. "This pond is the last open water body until stormwater ultimately discharges through a 4 by 8 foot box culvert at the Atlantic Ocean."  

The project is expected to cost all of the $350,000 appropriated for the work at Town Meeting in May, and Tedesco will contribute $100,000, over 10 ten years, to the dredging operation.

Because the ponds are wetlands, the dredging needed to be OK'd by the commission to ensure proper environmental precautions will be taken.

The commission approved the project Dec. 19.