Raleigh firm wants to remove Cape Fear River dams

Every tut-tut-tut of the hydraulic hammer into the remnants of the old hydroelectric dam brings the campaign to "Clear the Cape Fear" of manmade obstacles a small step - and chunk of concrete - closer to fruition.

Standing on the banks near the gaping hole that had been carved into the 270-foot-long concrete and earthen dam, George Howard pointed to the water gushing through the breach. "We're returning this river to its colonial days," said Howard, vice president and co-founder of Restoration Systems, a Raleigh-based environmental mitigation firm.

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The three locks run by the Army Corps of Engineers along the Lower Cape Fear, for example, are now opened only to provide passage to migratory fish. The commercial traffic they were built to serve dried up long ago, and recreational boats have slowed to a trickle.

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"I don't think there's any question that the dams are a tremendous break on the river's ability to produce fish," said Mike Wicker, a biologist with the U.S. Fish and Wildlife Service's Raleigh office. "Here we have a potentially very productive system that's being denied this productivity by these dams."


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