Free flowing: Carpentersville dam removal work nears completion

The Fox River is adapting to a new flow through Carpentersville as crews continue to work on removing a dam.

Work crews are expected to be out of the river and the dam removed by Halloween or Nov. 1, said Jennifer Rooks-Lopez, director of planning for the Kane County Forest Preserve District.

“We’re to the core of the dam itself,” she said.

Work on the $1.2 million project to remove the dam, funded by the Illinois Department of Natural Resources, started in early September. The dam’s removal will create a 10.2-mile unimpeded flow of the Fox River, the longest free-flowing stretch through Kane County.

Time-lapse videos of the dam removal can be viewed on the Kane County Forest Preserve District’s YouTube channel.

Officials have said a free-flowing river will result in an improvement in its health. Other portions of the river, where dams have been removed, have seen an increase in the number and species of fish in the river.

Rooks-Lopez said crews removed the concrete portion of the dam sections at a time and allowed the river to settle in between. The core of the dam, which officials believe was built between 1839 and 1850, is constructed of river stone and braced with timbers, she said.

“That’s made it a little more difficult to clean it up,” she said, adding that there is a lot of stone, ranging from small pebbles to larger boulders, to haul away.

Rooks-Lopez said some of the larger boulders will be incorporated back into the river. The forest preserve district is also looking for other district properties where the stones can be used.

While work is still ongoing, changes to the river are already visible. Above the dam, the river has narrowed. The forest preserve district will pay to extend a canoe and kayak launch north of the dam along the eastern edge at Fox River Shores, Rooks-Lopez said.

Volunteers also have relocated about 1,000 river-filtering mussels that were stranded as crews disassembled the dam.

She said crews should be finished before the Stratton Lock and Dam at the Chain O’ Lakes is open later this fall.

“We want to make sure we are out of the way before those water levels start to come back up,” she said.

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