Help NPS figure out what to do with historic properties emptied by the Tocks Island Dam project
Peters House at the intersection of Route 209 and Bushkill Falls Road in Bushkill, Penn., is one of the historic properties emptied by the never-completed Ticks Island Dam project. Part of the house dates to the middle of the 18th century. The National Parks Service recently completed stabilization work on the building to prevent further deterioration while plans are developed for all the properties in the Delaware Water Gap National Recreation Area. PHOTO PROVIDED
IF YOU LIVE NEAR the Delaware River, you'll know about one of the most contentious projects ever planned for the river: the Tocks Island Dam, which would have been the largest dam east of the Mississippi. The nascent environmental movement and strong local opposition put an end to the plans, but not before hundreds of properties were taken in eminent domain actions by the federal government. As plans for the dam were shelved, the National Parks Service was left as the "owner" of these properties.
For 50 years most of those properties have been empty and falling into disrepair. Now the NPS is looking to formulate a plan for those properties, with funding from, as the parks service press release states "Mitigation measures intended to compensate for adverse effects to cultural resources in the park from the construction and operation of the Susquehanna-Roseland Transmission Line."
The parks service is interested in sharing the information it has already gathered on the properties and in hearing what the public would like done with them. See a short film about the project here and watch a slide show here.
The schedule for the informational open house meetings is as follows:
January 28; 6-8 p.m.
Sussex County Technical School
105 North Church Road
Sparta, NJ 07871
January 29; 1-3 p.m.
East Stroudsburg University’s Innovation and Entrepreneurship Center
562 Independence Road (Off Route 447)
East Stroudsburg, PA 18301
January 29, 6-8 p.m.
Delaware Valley High School
256 Routes 6 and 209
Milford, PA 18337
January 30, 10 a.m.-noon
NPS Bushkill Meeting Center
Route 209
Bushkill, PA 18324
Our family lived by the Delaware River in Bushkill, Pa. We were a family of eight children, with our Mother and Grandmother. My Mom was forced out of the two story house my Father literally built himself!
Our Mother was only paid 32 cents on the actual dollar value of the house by the Government, using the “Eminent Domain” rule! Is there anything we can do now since the dam was never built?!
So many people were forced out of their homes for that never-built dam, causing a lot of resentment. As far as I know, no one has ever “re-opened” the issue of how much people were paid for their houses.