So for us that don't live there, is this a story about waterfront property owners now having enough water to use their docks & such? What is the max elevation of the dam before it reaches spillway level?

Total outsider here..... last year (Twice) those of us in North Texas lost a nice trout fishery in Broken Bow, OK due to mismanagement of water levels and releases. Instead of doing pre-storm releases, they kept the water and then were forced to open the gates and destroy the river when the storms hit. We can only wish we had people as pro-active about lake levels. For those of you angry about releases, be careful what you wish for.......

The lake is full right now managing water on a wet year is like farming on a wet year. It's how they handle stuff in the dry years and the other stuff I mentioned before that has everyone I have heard from so pissed at them that it wouldn't matter if what they were doing was logical or not they still wouldn't [censored] on them if they were on fire

That is why I'm unclear why everyone is up in arms because they are lowering the lake 1 foot.....

It's a matter of trust.

I'll jump in the fire here too with Rex ... Lol
I also work for LCRA but on the generation side not the water side.
One thing y'all have to remember is these are flood control lakes not recreation lakes. I hate that people have lost business or jobs because of the lake levels but that was your call to build/work on a flood control lake. You have to know that during floods or droughts that the levels aren't going to stay constant...period!

Fire away.....

Well my point was y'all have too much power and think y'all got a lot more. The first guy was posting about the 1018 thing. And I'm pretty sure the dams weren't put up for flood controll, you can't stop a flood with a damn. People I've talked to from co-ops say that y'all don't even sell much electricity like before because you're hard to deal with. Is that true?

So will anybody answer what the flood stage is for the spillway?

It does seem odd that the first excuse was "floodgate" work and now it's drawdown due to potential flooding.

I think it is at 1020.5. But they change stories for releasing pretty often, once it was so the carp or blue sucker could have the current that it needs.

Actually that is 100% incorrect, that is a major factor to why most dams were funded and created in this state and country. Austin used to have horrible floods prior to the highland lakes chain of dams.

Not sure why all the whining about the level being 1017 or 1018? Most people that live on the lake don't wont it too close to 1020, because when the wind gets up you get big rollers tearing up their docks, seawalls, and property. Why don't we just enjoy the full lake that we have and quit crying about it.

Sorry Dude, But that's that's a Dumb and Dumber statement...

I wish I could find the economic impact study of the Highland lakes when they were proposed in the mid-30s. (I did find it years ago but can't find it now) What it read was that Travis and Buch are flood control lakes and that both were very risky for businesses due to fluctuations in water levels.

Most of the land owning old timers never complained about the water levels. Seems it is only the new comers that have issues.

Just be thankful there is water in the lakes.

Mitigating a flood , so to lesson it. When the damn was built in the 30's there was no major supplier of electricity in the area. Johnson city produced the best source. It was built to for that seeing how slowing down a surge of water wouldn't pay the bill for building it. And a you can't tell me a damn stops a flood there's over 300 miles of River from pecan bayou to matagorda. A couple of damns in a 70 mile stretch isnt gonna do much. There hasn't been any big rains lately but if it ever came a flood they wouldn't stop it. Everybody has seen pecan bayou, the Colorado, the San Saba, Cherokee creek, llano River, and sandy creek on a 30' rise. 18 or so years ago when we had a widespread heavy rain there was water over the 2900 bridge, there was a eddy so big where the llano and Colorado hit it was sucking down boat docks with boats still in them. If the river is 30' high that's flooding. Above the damn below the damn and sometimes in between, a damn won't stop that.

And I don't know where you are from but around here if the old timers are talking about water rights, people snooping around their wells or any other stunt they pull they are talking about the lcra

Y'all are starting to sound like those Aggie hay haulers so I'm just gonna quit looking at this post.