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Assuming that the
population in the watershed remains stable, household size continues to
decrease (which is expected), and more than half of residential development
occurs in rural areas, we project that there could be about 100-125 new
houses built in in the watershed in the next 25 years. However, this does not
take the newly proposed zoning codes into consideration.
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To understand what this
means for water quality, we used our phosphorus model to predict how much
total phosphorus would enter the lake at different rates of developments.
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- If no new houses were built in the next 25 years,
our best estimate for total phosphorus in the lake is 15.3 ppb.
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- If 100-125 new houses are built, total phosphorus
would increase almost 1ppb up to 16.2.
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- If high development occurs and 200 new houses are
built, phosphorus will again increase up to 17.6ppb.
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With or without
development, both phosphorus estimates fall within the range where we would
expect to see algal blooms in the lake.
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With the new conservation
zone, development would be more limited and even less phosphorus would enter
the lake. However, the new conservation plan is just one factor to consider
when thinking about how to improve water quality because even without development
phosphorus levels are a still high enough to cause algal blooms. Either way,
there are trade-offs between development and other remediation techniques
which Megan will discuss next in our recommendations for the further
protection of Pattee Pond.
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