Norm,
You are definitely the guy to talk to! Not interested in hiring Lusk for this project, a trophy fishery is not my main concern. Our goal is to create a fishery just like you described above for handicapped groups, nursing homes, field trips, and kids derbies at no cost to the groups.
We are working with some area businesses and already have sponsors for various projects. On the to do list first thing is a fence and gate to keep tresspassers out and in some cases people in. About 100' of wheel chair accessible fishing shoreline on the 2 acre pond, tons of clean up and landscaping, revamp the building by turning the old cafeteria into a classroom (already has boys and girls bathrooms with 3 stalls each), and then get all of the necessary groups, inspectors, safety directors, etc to let us know what we need to do to cater to these people legally. We want to get the community involved and want to make this a world class facility! Keeping the ponds stocked with fish will not be a problem at all. We constantly remove thousands of bluegill, bass, and crappie from clients lakes and 1 lb catfish and rainbows are cheap to buy and readily available year round.
The place is our trout ponds owned by Dixons Seafoods that I have talked about in recent threads. It is about 10 acres and has 3 ponds that are fed by a series of springs. (not the typical illinois springs either, im talking about thousands of gallons of water pouring in and out every day)
The water shoots out of about 250 2" diameter pipes that are stuck in the ground in various places and is collected in a series of 4 pools about 1/10 of an acre each.
The water then goes through about 50' of culvert and shoots into the first pond (about a 1' drop into the pond) This creates a current that flows pretty good around the pond.
The first pond drains drains into the 2 other ponds, one on each side, then into the illinois river from each pond. the first pond is about 1 acre, the 2nd about 2 acres and the third about 3 acres. All ponds are 6' deep most all the way around because of retaining walls are all the way around. The bottom of the ponds are mostly rocks.
They used to operate one of the first fee fishing lakes in America starting in the 1930's. They would catch carp and catfish from the river and stock their ponds with them. They did this until about 10 years ago they shut that operation down. They haven't used the ponds for anything since then.
This place is set up for fishing with retaining walls and easy access completely around all three ponds, it just needs to be cleaned up and a few walls repaired. One big hurdle we have is that the ponds gravity drain into the illinois river, and when the river gets above 25 feet, they dont drain anymore and start filling up against the levee. The river never comes in, just all three ponds become one pond until the river goes back down. We need to keep that in mind when building handicapped accessible structures.
Norm,
That is where I need the most immediate help is designing some sort of wheel chair fishing area about 100 to 200 feet long. The pond is only 1 foot lower than the parking lot which borders the edge of the 2 acre pond for about 250'. A retaining wall goes the whole way down the pond. All I need to do is basically put up a railing and then some sort of floor (currently white rock).
Concrete sidewalk is an option, or we were thinking wood deck boards. How tall should the railing be?
