With its stunning views of the Shawangunk Ridge and its abundance of open space, the Town of Gardiner is a tempting target for developers, and the community has become accustomed in recent years to bitter controversy over large development proposals in pristine rural areas. In its update to the Comprehensive Plan adopted in 2022, the Town Board made it a high priority to steer new development toward areas that are already developed – first and foremost, the downtown hamlet. Zoning that encourages greater density in built-up areas, known in Plannerese as “infill,” is widely accepted as a proactive preventive measure to contain unsightly sprawl development.
But now, questions arise as to whether the hamlet is ready to absorb significant new infill, and if so, how much. The Town is currently in the design phase for improvements to the hamlet’s sewer infrastructure that were recommended in a 2020 inflow and infiltration study, and work on those fixes is planned to get underway in 2024. A downtown Sewer District exists; however, a municipal Water District does not.
In downtown Gardiner, residents and businesses rely on well water, and cumulatively, assorted studies over the years have suggested that those wells may not hold out much longer, if growth in the hamlet continues as projected. New high-volume water users such as restaurants and laundromats could stretch the existing groundwater supply beyond its capacity. The long-term solution may be to seek out a local source for a municipal water supply, according to a report recently presented to the Town Board by biologist Jon Benner on behalf of Gardiner’s Drinking Water Protection Committee (DWPC).
At the Town Board’s December 12 meeting, Benner reviewed in detail the history of Gardiner’s various attempts to determine the reliability of the supply of natural drinking water to the downtown core. He noted that shallow dug wells, which were common in the 19th and early 20th century, have long since dried up. Owners of some drilled wells have had to drill them deeper in years of prolonged drought. Past studies – including a transducer monitoring program in place in six downtown wells since 2014, and aquifer stress tests, a/k/a pumping tests, at two downtown locations in 2011 and 2013 – have indicated that water levels in the hamlet’s existing wells have not declined significantly on average over time.
However, there are reasons to worry about whether downtown development is reaching its limit, in terms of how many more wells can be supported, Benner says. He explained that placing multiple wells close together, as in the hamlet, creates an aggregate effect of lowering the water table in the vicinity, which hydrogeologists call a “cone of depression.” He likened the process to “having many straws in one glass of drinking water.”
As a case study, he cited a three-dwelling subdivision proposed for a vacant lot at Fourth Street and Every Avenue, “an area of high well density in the hamlet.” The development calls for two additional wells to be drilled. The existing well on the property was only producing two gallons per minute and had to be redrilled in 2018. The Planning Board is currently wrestling with the question of whether or not to require the applicant to conduct a pumping test, and if so, to measure the impact on neighbors’ wells. Although Gardiner zoning code does not at present mandate such a test on a lot of this size – legislation drafted in 2013 to create an Aquifer Overlay District for the downtown was never adopted by the Town Board – the Planning Board has the discretionary power to impose it.
Part of the supply problem, according to hydrogeologists who have studied Gardiner’s groundwater going back as far as 1989, is that the township’s Martinsburg shale bedrock doesn’t have an aquifer of fossil water. The cracks and fissures that are tapped by drilled wells rely entirely on rainwater to recharge, making them vulnerable to drought conditions. In the hamlet, water used in businesses and households doesn’t return to the ground; it goes to the sewage plant and ends up in the Wallkill River.
A much more promising source is the sand-and-gravel aquifer that was identified in 2001 by “rockstar geologist” Allan Randall as likely to exist along the paleo-Wallkill Valley, which extends more broadly than the present-day riverbed and has a larger potential recharge area. Randall predicted that such an aquifer might be capable of producing a high-volume municipal supply, and recommended that exploratory drilling be conducted to confirm its existence and boundaries. A recent test well tapping the sand-and-gravel layer by the owners of the proposed 133-home Fall Park development near Church Farm Road hit a “gusher,” Benner said, producing water at a rate greater than 100 gallons per minute.
The report prepared by Benner and the DWPC concluded by urging the Town Board to begin exploring potential sites for highly productive wells on municipal properties that lie atop the sand-and-gravel deposits, with Majestic Park a likely place to start. Benner recommended hiring a consultant to take another look at whether the long-proposed Aquifer Overlay District should be a priority, and also suggested that zoning law in the hamlet should make testing well capacity and recharge rates – including the impact on surrounding wells – mandatory for would-be developers.
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