Plan For Timber Brings Memories Flooding Back

Marshall Run Area’s Residents Concerned

By Hannah Northey
Daily News-Record
September 28, 2007


Mary Ann and John Cunningham remember 4 to 6 inches of yellow, mucky water flowing down their driveway onYankeetown Road during a flood in the spring of 1996.

During the deluge, they heard their daughter Chloe, then 19, yell for help. The roads were washed out in the neighborhood 3 miles west of Fulks Run, and Chloe was trapped.

With flashlights, the Cunninghams guided Chloe to higher ground and back to their home, where they’ve lived for 33 years.

For the next five months, the Cunninghams’ six neighbors along Marshall Run, a tributary of the North Fork of theShenandoah River, hiked through waterways to get to their homes.

“It was a mess. We couldn’t get any help out there,” said Walter Sampson, who’s had a second home along Marshall Run for seven years.

With those memories fresh in their minds, neighbors say they’re concerned that a recent proposal to log, burn and introduce roads in their area could lead to even more flooding.

“At this point, everybody along this creek can tell you a story like that. Our lives have been traumatized,” Mary Ann Cunningham said.

The Marshall Run Timber Sale

The neighborhood along Marshall Run sits on a private piece of land that juts into the George Washington & Jefferson National Forests.

Water from Shenandoah Mountain drains into Root Run, which empties into Marshall Run and on into the North Fork of the Shenandoah River.

Officials with the National Forest Service are proposing to harvest 185 acres of upland hardwoods in nine areas around the Marshall Run watershed and put in 2.4 miles of new road, a mile of which will be temporary. The proposal also calls for a prescribed burn in the area of more than 1,300 acres.

Additionally, the plan would create 13 acres of temporary grass openings and a year-round water source for wildlife, which would “improve habitat conditions for various species, including black bear,” said Mark Healey, the timber management officer for the forests’ North River Ranger District.

The area is scheduled for logging, Healey said, based on a 15-year cycle used by the forest service. It will be selectively logged, he said, to leave behind areas of “dog-hair-thick” vegetation for animal habitat.

Diseased and dying trees are routinely logged first. The logs will be sold, likely for $400 an acre, to potential local buyers. The money, Healey said, “comes back to improve conditions in the sale area for wildlife.”

Concerns Of Flooding

But the Cunninghams say the plan doesn’t account for erosion and increased runoff from logging and road building that could further weaken fragile stream banks in Marshall Run.

The method of cutting into the mountain to create a flat surface for roads depletes the amount of earth that sucks up moisture.

Sampson said he’s concerned streams and culverts on his property will be more susceptible to flooding. And changing avenues of runoff through logging and road building could cause flooding in other sections of the forest, he said.

“A tremendous rush of water runs down [the mountains] after heavy rains,” he said. “That background puts me in a position to be against cutting that puts more water in Marshall run.”

Because the neighborhood is built on a private road that’s not maintained by the state, residents pay for repairing bridges, banks and roads, according to the Virginia Department of Transportation.

The Cunninghams say they’re not complaining about paying for repairs, but they may not have the funds to deal with an increase in severe flooding.

“More water will run off and shoot into Marshall Run and there’s no telling what will happen,” Mary Ann Cunningham said.

Making It Count

The public, Healey said, is welcome to comment on the proposal. The remarks will be gathered, evaluated and summarized in an environmental assessment to be completed in the fall of 2008, he said.

At that time, Elwood Burge, district ranger for the North River Ranger District, will make a decision on how to proceed with the project. After that, Healey said, residents have an opportunity to appeal to the forest service.

He said the roads are not definite at this point, and that all aspects of the proposal could change with public comment.

But John Burkhardt, a resident of Yankeetown Road, said he’s appealed projects in the past and fought them “to the end” without much success.

“That’s forest service policy,” he said. “The whole public comment thing is something they do because it’s required by law … but I’m not sure it makes much difference.”


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