Meet Bill Meserve and Cal Killen, two of the people responsible for managing water levels in the Glen Lakes as well as the Crystal River. Under the auspices of the Glen Lake Association (GLA), these volunteers serve on the Water Level Committee appointed to balance the needs and demands of both lake shore and river’s edge owners, as well as the businesses that depend on these stunningly beautiful and fragile water resources.
June swelled Lake Michigan by another 4 inches which is bad news for Megan Grosvenor Munoz, whose family owns and operates Manitou Island Transit. The company ferries passengers on pleasure tours to the Manitou Islands out of Leland. This spring and summer, they’ve had to cancel four or five trips, Munoz says, “because we can’t get people on South [Manitou] safely” due to water splashing over the dock on the island.”
We are closely monitoring Lake Michigan’s extreme high water levels this summer—their impact on beaches and beach walking, commerce and the economy, and whether their meteoric rise since bottoming out in 2013 represents a “new normal” in the age of Climate Change.
When the US Army Corps of Engineers measured Lake Michigan and Lake Huron water levels at the end of December, they discovered that the depth had receded to 576.15 feet above sea level — breaking the record for the previous all-time-low of 576.2 feet set in 1964. That’s not a record to celebrate. Numbers are complex and difficult to comprehend. But beaches along Sleeping Bear Bay offered more clarity, and sobering clarity at that. The shoreline has receded substantially from previous years, leaving behind a hard, rocky surface in places, and prompting widespread alarm.