Stretches of lake bed are showing at Falls Lake, the reservoir that supplies Raleigh, after the water dropped more than five feet in a dry fall. Raleigh Water’s Ed Buchan told WRAL News on Oct. 29 that the utility wants customers to cut back on watering their lawns, even though no mandatory restrictions are in place.
The request reaches well beyond the city. Raleigh Water serves Raleigh, Garner, Knightdale, Rolesville, Wake Forest, Wendell and Zebulon, and the city’s Permanent Conservation Measures apply to customers in all seven.
Five feet down at Falls Lake
Buchan told WRAL that about 67 percent of the lake’s drinking water allocation remains, a figure that does not mean the lake itself is 67 percent full. Buchan described the utility as being in pretty good shape for now. WRAL reported that Stage 1 restrictions for October are triggered at around 45 percent of the allocation.
The National Weather Service’s Raleigh office sees the reservoir slipping back. In its Oct. 27 drought information statement, the office said Falls and Jordan lakes were approaching the levels they held in June, before helpful July rain, and that the John H. Kerr Reservoir is operating under drought contingency plans…