Lake John Wetland Mitigation Design

The City of Mount Dora needed a firm with extensive knowledge on proper placement and enhancement of wetlands for this mitigation design project in support of a stormwater retrofit design project.

DRMP’s biologists provided a detailed wetland planting plan to enhance and promote the natural ecosystem associated with water bodies and to double as mitigation for all environmental impacts to the project.  The project involved a stormwater retrofit project that was recommended in the Lake Gertrude Drainage Basin Study.  This retrofit project specifically involved expansion and re-shaping of the existing Lake John, which is a series of three lobes that at times function as a lake but much of the time reacts independently as smaller depressions.  The St. Johns River Water Management District (SJRWMD) and the City of Mount Dora tasked DRMP with completing this design retrofit, developing the planting plan, permitting and conducting construction activities.

The project increased the size and depth of the wetland lobes to increase the City’s flood protection as well as improve water quality for a 364-acre basin that ultimately discharges into Lake Gertrude.