A beloved and scenic pond in a popular Colorado mountain town will remain dry after state water officials found that the channel feeding it is an illegal, manmade ditch with no water rights. The pond on the outskirts of Twin Lakes became the center of a contentious fight between some town residents and a luxury real estate developer hoping to build a complex of mansions east of the tiny town in central Colorado. Photos of the pond, known locally as the “Barn Pond,” adorned postcards and tourism websites.
When filled, the pond reflected an old barn and the snowcapped peaks of the Sawatch Range. Some town residents were outraged when the pond went dry earlier this year after construction by the developer. The development company, AngelView at Twin Lakes , this spring deepened the streambed where the two channels split, sending all the water to the channel that flows southeast and drying the channel flowing southwest to the pond.
The developer, Alan Elias, said the deepening was necessary to comply with a legal obligation to measure water flow farther downstream. Elias, his water engineer and water lawyer said the company had no obligation to send water down the channel to the Barn Pond because that channel was an illegal ditch. The Colorado Division of Water Resources’ engineers agreed.
The state’s top water allocation officials on Monday issued a memo finding the channel and pond were manmade and that there is no obligation to send water down the stream to the pond. Th.