A recent decision by a Texas judge at least temporarily halted the construction of a proposed reservoir near Wichita Falls, Texas that has glaring similarities to the Northeast Texas opposition to the proposed Marvin Nichols Reservoir in the Sulphur River Basin.
While the proposed Ringgold Reservoir is roughly a quarter of the size of the footprint of Marvin Nichols, it has also been deemed a landgrab and unnecessary by those who would be negatively impacted by its construction.
Lake Ringgold is proposed to permanently flood 16,000 acres, taking a total of more than 40,000 acres out of production at a cost of more than $450 million. The Texas Conservation Alliance noted that most of that acreage is privately owned ranch land supporting families in Clay County. That land includes more than 1,500 acres of extremely rare native tallgrass prairie, the type of habitat that sustained bison herds and native American tribes for thousands of years.
