Tourist Park Dam Rebuilt
Nearly a decade after it was destroyed, the Tourist Park Dam in Marquette has now been rebuilt.
The Marquette Board of Light & Power, the Lake Superior Community Partnership, city elected officials and city employees were on hand for a ribbon-cutting this afternoon.
The project cost about $4.8 million.
Marquette Board of Light & Power project manager Erik Booth says one of the workers who poured the concrete for the dam is a grandson of a worker who helped build the original dam.
He also says many people have told the workers and BLP officials that they learned to fish in the Tourist Park Basin and are happy it’s coming back.
Besides restoring the basin as a swimming, fishing, canoeing and kayaking area, the new dam will generate power for 500 homes for at least the next 30 years.
The May 2003 Dead River flood that destroyed the original dam forced about 2,300 people to evacuate their homes.
It also caused about $100 million in damages.