Receding Ga. Lake Exposes Past

[Ghost in the Machine]

Receding Ga. Lake Exposes Past
Published: 12/24/07, 3:05 AM EDT
By GREG BLUESTEIN

GAINESVILLE, Ga. (AP) - The acres of drying mud that span much of what once was Lake Lanier jolt to a stop at a bend, where a concrete foundation appears as a sudden reminder of life before the lake.

As a record drought continues to take its toll on the lake that supplies more than 3 million residents with water in metro Atlanta, the receding shore line is revealing more than antique beer cans and other assorted garbage.

It is also offering a glimpse of how the people who made their homes here decades ago once lived.

An abandoned stretch of Georgia Highway 53 sits along one edge of the lake, consigned to the deep by state planners when Lanier was built. Foundations of long-forgotten buildings dot shorelines. Elsewhere in the vast expanse of exposed lake bed, a still intact one-lane road with faded yellow lines peeks out from the mud.

Outside Gainesville's Laurel Park, the concrete foundation is a remnant of what once was the Gainesville Speedway, a popular dirt racing track that was submerged when the federal government created the lake in the 1950s.

http://www.att.net/s/editorial.dll?bfromind=7814&eeid=5599662&_sitecat=1522&dcatid=0&eetype=article&render=y&ac=3&ck=&ch=ne

[demnan]

1. My brother and his wife live in Dahlonega

The entire area down there seems like it was thrown away and forgotten for a while. There are old abandoned shacks on the way to my brother's new housing development. Like the place was really empty for a long while. The place is rebuilding from South Floridians who got tired of the hurricanes, but now have to suffer through a drought.

My brother is a poster child for global warming.

[Ghost in the Machine]

2. There's places like that where I live... real remote & rural

There's several homes here in my county in East Tennessee that still don't have electricity, running water or indoor plumbing...

[greenman3610]

3. this is global

Poyang lake, largest freshwater lake in China,
7/22/07


same lake 11/03/07


http://www.terradaily.com/reports/Drought_sapping_Chinas_biggest_fresh_water_lake_reports_999.html
Water levels in China's largest fresh water lake are nearing record lows as a drought exacerbates existing shortages, state media said Wednesday.
The situation in Poyang Lake in east China's Jiangxi province had caused severe water shortages for industrial and residential users, Xinhua news agency reported

[burythehatchet]

4. I believe they found Andrew Young's conscience