On April 20, 2022, CPWB wrote to the chairs and staff of Falmouth’s Water Quality Management Committee and Conservation Commission, Mashpee’s Conservation Commission and both towns’ conservation agents and public works directors about Red Brook. The old cranberry-bog dam under Red Brook Road, on the town line, had failed the year before, and the towns were working with consultants on how to fix it.
CPWB asked the towns to give extra weight to options that reduce the nutrients reaching Hamblin Pond and Waquoit Bay, which are already far above their state nitrogen limits. The letter cited Brian Howes’s 2021 finding that no high-quality water was left anywhere in Waquoit Bay, said CPWB would not support a fix that risked sending more nutrients downstream, and suggested a combination of restored stream flow with open water and wetlands designed to absorb nutrients, which could restore fish habitat at the same time.
Read the engineers’ 2022 Red Brook feasibility study and the 2026 approval of the new culvert.
Drafted with AI assistance from the linked source.
