Viewpoint: What will become of Lake Accotink?
By Paul Gilbert
One of Fairfax County’s most beloved parks is at a crossroads – and Fairfax County wants your input.
Lake Accotink draws 250,000 visitors a year. Along with Burke Lake and Lake Fairfax, it is one of three lakefront parks that serve as the anchor attractions of the Park Authority system. Think of them as the anchor stores in a shopping mall – the big draws that are central to the system.
The lake has been slowly filling with silt (dirt) from upstream runoff for decades. It was dredged in 1967, 1985, and 2008. It needs dredging again. That is not a crisis; maintenance is the cost of ownership.
In 2018, there was a proposal by the county to get rid of the lake to save money. That sparked the creation of Save Lake Accotink, a local advocacy group.
Thr costs spiraled
In 2019, dredging was estimated at $30.5 million. By 2023, that figure had ballooned to $95 million. The 2023 estimate had a $395 million price tag for 25 years, based on dredging every five years. That was not a great assumption, considering that in the past dredging was needed about every 20 years.
Two things drove up the costs.
First, the volume of sediment to be removed grew from 350,000 to 500,000 cubic yards – a 43 percent jump. The higher number simply gives you a deeper lake, which is not the primary need.
Second, and more damaging, Dominion Power refused to allow the county to use the Wakefield Park power line easement to dry the dredged material before it is trucked away. That had been the cornerstone of the affordable plan. Dominion refused to be inconvenienced, and that is costing you and me.
Where things stand
Rather than give up, James Walkinshaw (then Braddock Supervisor and currently a member of Congress) convened a task force that produced a workable path forward: preserve a smaller lake – at 40, 30, or 20 acres.
An open house on June 6, attended by Walkinshaw and supervisors Rachna Sizemore Heizer (Braddock) and Rodney Lusk (Franconia), updated residents on the ongoing Smaller Lake Accotink Preservation Feasibility Study.
In my view, the county should hold out for 40 acres. The smaller options cost less but give up too much. A 20-acre lake is not Lake Accotink – it is a pond. We need to take the long view and realize that having lake parks is one of the great assets of Fairfax County.
I grew up in Springfield. I biked around that lake as a kid and sailed it in a boat I bought with lawnmowing money. Lake Accotink is part of who we are.
Tell your county leaders you want a 40-acre lake similar to the one we have enjoyed for decades. Submit feedback on the Lake Accotink study on the Engage Fairfax County website.
Paul Gilbert served as executive director of NOVA Parks for 20 years and in 2025 received the Pugsley Medal, the nation’s highest award for contributions to the conservation of public parks. He lives blocks from Lake Accotink and took part recreational activities at the lake since he was a child.
My family spent over 10 years enjoying this lake . The nature the trails it is a family place that must be protected.
The sheer absurdity of the Lake Accotink situation—where a county was about to let a beloved 50-acre lake vanish because the rules made fixing it too expensive—has actually forced the regulators and engineers to start rewriting the playbook.
In the ongoing Smaller Lake Feasibility Study, the county is pushing for what is called “Beneficial Reuse.” They are essentially trying to force regulators to look at the big picture by arguing: We aren’t creating industrial waste. We are rearranging the native landscape to create a healthier ecosystem.
If they can get the state to agree to a compromise—allowing them to use the dried mud right there in the park to build new, managed wetlands—it will be a massive victory for common sense. It would prove that environmental management shouldn’t be handcuffed by rules meant for factories, allowing engineers to actually manage the problem instead of just watching the lake choke to death.
Thanks for posting this and how we can get involved!
I appreciate our waterways – streams, lakes, rivers around Northern Virginia. But fiscal responsibility would certainly consider $400M beyond reasonable. This doesn’t even include ongoing maintenance, they couldn’t lower water levels last year because a drain stem valve was damaged. So that needs repair. And we need to wait for what is identified with the inspection and the projected costs. At 60 years old since this structure was build by the Army Corp of Engineers, it could be due for major maintenance. Many dams like bridges and other public infrastructure around the country have barely passing safety grades.
Climatology trends continues to show increasing monsoonal storms with flash floods. These will add more silt (more dredging) and debris (that requires removal).
Maybe the county can sell sediment rather than paying to dispose of it. Areas in FFX as well as neighboring communities could possibly use some to stem flooding. Norfolk area is always doing beach renourishment and with rising sea levels, 500,000 cubic yards of sediment certainly has to have value. Sell it to the Norfolk Navy base to raise areas from their common flooding issues. The later could even lower the cost of the effort (since the military in doing the work, could and likely would use the threat of eminent domain to dry the dirt). And I’m confused why our county supervisors don’t use eminent domain since Dominion is always jacking up our rates to support data centers.
If there is a dredging that isn’t being paid for by external parties and the BoS don’t put the onus on Dominion to allow the cheaper solution, then we need a BoS which isn’t owned by big business – so they all need to be voted out and supervisors who will work for the tax payers best interests.
Side note : All around the country, removal of man-made dams to return waterways to their natural habitat is taking place (fish can spawn in their historical beds – like the salmon going past the former Klamath Dam). Perhaps the atlantic salmon will return to the Potomac tributary fisheries (like the western salmons did up the klamath river). That would truly be astounding to watch salmon swim up Accotink creek!
Hear me out on this : I am a sailor and I love water/lakes but to be honest, this lake isn’t that great and I feel like the costs don’t outweigh the benefits. I think we should focus on the other lakes and come up with a new plan (Caveat, I understand the proponents. I was initially sad when I heard they might get rid of the lake)
Alternative plan: The county only has one FREE outdoor pool. This part of the county unfortunately has a lot of inequities and many people do not have access to an aquatic facility. I think we should build a massive indoor/outdoor aquatic facility where the lake is and talk to sponsors such as USA swimming to help subsidize the cost. We could charge an admission fee for the first 5 years to help cover the cost with a plan to eventually phase it out. The county can charge for swim teams, rentals, and other events to make revenue to keep the facility running with the help of sponsors. We do not have a single free aquatic facility in the county other than one small outdoor pool in Alexandria. This could become a major destination. If we make it a convertible indoor/outdoor facility then it can be used year round. I think this would be something the whole community could support and it could help close gaps to better serve underserved communities. This may end up costing more than fixing the lake but I think it would end up being better for the county in the long term and would hopefully end up bringing in positive revenue from facility/lane rentals
Uhhh… rec centers? They’re not free but they’re pretty cheap and the county does rentals, supports swim teams, etc. Putting a massive indoor/outdoor aquatic facility on top of a wetland? Do you have any other ideas?
They never should have built the lake in the first place. Let it be. The trails aren’t going anywhere. Hope there is some ecologically sound method to deconstruct that dam. To attempt to fix the lake would be more trouble than it’s worth, including the nuisance of construction in the N. Springfield/Ravensworth area. If you want to see an example of a man made lake that seems to be working, go to Greenbrier Lake in Maryland where the lake is being fed by drinkable springwater. I cosign Ken’s side note!
Do you know the history of the lake? It was used as a reservoir going back to World War I and became surplus in the 60’s when the Park Authority won a auction for the land. The dam and lake had been there for many decades before it became a park. Runoff from development has silted it from what was in 1960 100 acres to what is now somewhere around 40. It’s the paving over of Fairfax County and poor runoff management which has led to the current situation. I believe Lake Accotink serves the now much more densely populated county far better and more uniquely than any of the alternatives. Address the runoff problem, preserve this asset, and provide for future generations.
Co-locate casinos, data centers, and public housing with man-made lakes. The former two being required to maintain the latter using willing residents.
Oh stop – we just need more bike lanes! Trust Fairfax County Leaders…
Sad to see county lakes in dire straights. The county is in high debt. There is no affordable way by county budget to do the maintenance required.If another entity can fund the fix ok.But there other budget priorities of more importance.Thank you
The history of the lake’s maintenance bas been a circus. Just a few years ago they dredged and pumped the sludge through a pipe over to the Edsall Road industrial park. They ran the pipe above ground using the Railroad property. More recently they placed a barge in the water and blindly pulled the muck. At that timeframe there was a Lake Accotink Days celebration. I asked one of the County/Park/Lake experts why they wouldn’t just drain and bulldoze. He said it would take too long for the lakebed to dry out to support the equipment. Just weeks after they “finished the dredging” the lake was drained to perform work on the dam. It makes no sense that there isn’t better coordination in maintenance efforts. Drain the lake and contour the lake bed and thoroughly clean the lake. More importantly why hasn’t anybody (talking to you Annandale Today) asked the County BoS why they aren’t addressing upstream storm management and silt runoff?
The problem is really simple, but it’s been obscured. Only understanding the problem can put the estimates into perspective.
Nearly 1/3 of the Accotink Creek Watershed is covered by impermeable surfaces, which were put in place without stormwater management facilities. That means all the rain that falls on these surfaces runs straight into the creek, unabated. The rush of rain water from streets and parking lots erodes the stream banks and scours the stream bed. When the sediment laden water hits the lake, it slows down, and a large proportion of the sediment settles to the lake bed. This is sediment that does not continue downstream, toward the Chesapeake Bay.
Because the Chesapeake Bay lies downstream, the EPA has been concerned about pollutants such as sediment in Accotink Creek. Environmental regulations are requiring the county to take measures to reduce the amount of sediment in Accotink Creek, which Lake Accotink is actively removing from the stream, hence the need to dredge. Here’s where it get strange. The regulations, negotiated by the county following a successful lawsuit against the EPA, don’t require the county to actually reduce the sediment load. The county only needs to undertake projects to earn predetermined amounts of credit for sediment load reduction. And no one is measuring whether the sediment load is actually diminishing. So far, the county has spent more than $100 million on these projects with no demonstrable evidence they are working. To the contrary, scientists at GMU’s Potomac Environmental Research and Education Center have noted evidence that sediment from Accotink Creek continues to degrade flora quality in the Potomac River’s Gunston Cove.
Here’s the kicker. After all the work to earn sediment reduction credits, as opposed to actual sediment reduction, at exorbitant cost and the EPA finally notices that the sediment load remains too high, how much will it cost Fairfax County tax payers to finally remove the sediment from Accotink Creek without the benefit of a lake large enough to have an appreciable impact on the sediment load? The county will have to either pave Accotink Creek like the LA River or retrofit the watershed with adequate stormwater management facilities. Dredging and expanding the size of Lake Accotink with 25 years of maintenance at a price of $395 million is likely a bargain, especially when you consider the value of the lake to the Park Authority and the community. We should be discussing restoring the lake to its original 100+ acre footprint, but we must not accept a smaller lake for the sake of fiscal responsibility. The hidden costs is a smaller lake are prohibitively high.
Allan Robertson, thank you for the insightful post. The lake is a giant filter for storm water. Like all filters, it needs to be maintained.
This area is overgrown and our natural lands need to be protected. Money hungry developers will never stop. They have to be. Preserve and protect our land, animals, and ability for families to gather together. The park allows for exercise, fun and a beautiful place to create memories. PLEASE LEAVE THE PARK ALONE!