Campbell Lake (Anchorage, Alaska)
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Campbell Lake is a lake in
Anchorage Anchorage, officially the Municipality of Anchorage, is the most populous city in the U.S. state of Alaska. With a population of 291,247 at the 2020 census, it contains nearly 40 percent of the state's population. The Anchorage metropolita ...
,
Alaska Alaska ( ) is a non-contiguous U.S. state on the northwest extremity of North America. Part of the Western United States region, it is one of the two non-contiguous U.S. states, alongside Hawaii. Alaska is also considered to be the north ...
, United States.


History

Campbell Lake was formed in 1958 when Anchorage residents David Alm and George McCullough constructed an earthen dam to block the outflow of Campbell Creek, creating an artificial lake over
intertidal wetland An intertidal wetland is an area along a shoreline that is exposed to air at low tide and submerged at high tide. This type of wetland is defined by an intertidal zone and includes its own intertidal ecosystems. Description The main types of ...
s. It is home to several notable Anchorage residents including former newspaper publisher Alice Rogoff, who hosted sitting US President
Barack Obama Barack Hussein Obama II (born August 4, 1961) is an American politician who was the 44th president of the United States from 2009 to 2017. A member of the Democratic Party, he was the first African American president in American history. O ...
at her lakeside residence in 2015 during his only visit to Alaska. The Campbell Lake dam failed during the 1964 Anchorage earthquake and again in 1989 when heavy rains caused a nearly 20-fold increase in water flow into the lake. During the
2018 Anchorage earthquake On November 30, 2018, at 8:29 a.m. Alaska Time Zone, AKST (17:29 UTC), a Seismic magnitude scales#Mww, magnitude 7.1 earthquake hit Anchorage, Alaska, Anchorage in Southcentral Alaska, South Central Alaska. The earthquake's epicenter ...
, a sewer pipe became dislodged under the lakebed, requiring drainage of the lake in May 2019 for repairs.


Hydrology and ecology

Campbell Lake receives inflow from a portion of the
Chugach Mountains The Chugach Mountains of southern Alaska are the northernmost of the several mountain ranges that make up the Pacific Coast Ranges of the western edge of North America. The range is about long and wide, and extends from the Knik and Turnag ...
via the Campbell Creek watershed. Its outflow is a shallow
estuary An estuary is a partially enclosed coastal body of brackish water with one or more rivers or streams flowing into it, and with a free connection to the open sea. Estuaries form a transition zone between river environments and maritime enviro ...
into
Turnagain Arm Turnagain Arm (Denaʼina language, Dena'ina: ''Tutl'uh'') is a waterway into the northwestern part of the Gulf of Alaska. It is one of two narrow branches at the north end of Cook Inlet, the other being Knik Arm. Turnagain is subject to climate e ...
. Lake water temperatures exhibit a
thermocline A thermocline (also known as the thermal layer or the metalimnion in lakes) is a distinct layer based on temperature within a large body of fluid (e.g. water, as in an ocean or lake; or air, e.g. an atmosphere) with a high gradient of distinct te ...
in summer and a reverse
thermocline A thermocline (also known as the thermal layer or the metalimnion in lakes) is a distinct layer based on temperature within a large body of fluid (e.g. water, as in an ocean or lake; or air, e.g. an atmosphere) with a high gradient of distinct te ...
in winter, with
surface A surface, as the term is most generally used, is the outermost or uppermost layer of a physical object or space. It is the portion or region of the object that can first be perceived by an observer using the senses of sight and touch, and is ...
temperatures varying between approximately in December to in July. At approximately 123 acres, Campbell Lake is the largest lake in Anchorage, Alaska. However, if considered as a single continuous body of water, the combination of nearby Lake Hood and Lake Spenard (which are connected by a natural channel) would be larger. Several fish species in the lake include
coho salmon The coho salmon (''Oncorhynchus kisutch;'' Karuk: achvuun) is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family (biology), family and one of the five Pacific salmon species. Coho salmon are also known as silver salmon (or "silvers") and is often ...
,
chinook salmon The Chinook salmon (''Oncorhynchus tshawytscha'') is the largest and most valuable species of Oncorhynchus, Pacific salmon. Its common name is derived from the Chinookan peoples. Other vernacular names for the species include king salmon, quinn ...
, and
blackfish Blackfish is a common name for various species of fishes and cetaceans, including: Fish * Alaska blackfish (''Dallia pectoralis''), an Esocidae, esocid from Alaska, Siberia, and the Bering Sea islands * Black fish (''Carassioides acuminatus''), ...
. The lake has been stocked with
coho salmon The coho salmon (''Oncorhynchus kisutch;'' Karuk: achvuun) is a species of anadromous fish in the salmon family (biology), family and one of the five Pacific salmon species. Coho salmon are also known as silver salmon (or "silvers") and is often ...
by the
Alaska Department of Fish and Game The Alaska Department of Fish and Game (ADF&G) is a department within the government of Alaska. ADF&G's mission is to protect, maintain, and improve the fish, game, and aquatic plant resources of the state, and manage their use and development i ...
to support upstream
sport fishing Recreational fishing, also called sport fishing or game fishing, is fishing for leisure, exercise or competition. It can be contrasted with commercial fishing, which is occupational fishing activities done for profit; or subsistence fishing, ...
. However, fishing is not permitted in the lake.


Ownership and access

In September 2019, Campbell Lake was the subject of an investigative report arguing that the lake, which was long held to be private, was public under Alaska
statutory law A statute is a law or formal written enactment of a legislature. Statutes typically declare, command or prohibit something. Statutes are distinguished from court law and unwritten law (also known as common law) in that they are the expressed wi ...
. In December 2019, the City of Anchorage and the State of Alaska released a joint statement clarifying that the lake is open to the public for "boating and all forms of permissible recreation." Campbell Lake can be legally accessed by the public in one of three ways: # By water, using Campbell Creek # By air, using a
floatplane A floatplane is a type of seaplane with one or more slender floats mounted under the fuselage to provide buoyancy. By contrast, a flying boat uses its fuselage for buoyancy. Either type of seaplane may also have landing gear suitable for land, ...
or other aircraft # By land, using one of two public
easements An easement is a nonpossessory right to use or enter onto the real property of another without possessing it. It is "best typified in the right of way which one landowner, A, may enjoy over the land of another, B". An easement is a property rig ...
, both of which can be used "without permission" of private property owners. These easements were surveyed and marked in January 2020.


See also

*
List of lakes of Alaska Alaska has about 3,197 officially named natural lakes, more than 409,000 natural lakes at least one hectare or bigger, approximately 67 named artificial reservoirs, and 167 named dams. For named artificial reservoirs and dams, see the List of da ...
* Sturgeon v. Frost – Two
Supreme Court of the United States The Supreme Court of the United States (SCOTUS) is the highest court in the federal judiciary of the United States. It has ultimate appellate jurisdiction over all Federal tribunals in the United States, U.S. federal court cases, and over Stat ...
cases about public access to Alaskan navigable waterways.


References

{{authority control Lakes of Alaska Bodies of water of Anchorage, Alaska