New Fountains to Tackle Newton Lake Green Film

The new fountains spouting water in Newton Lake don’t just add a touch of class to the waterway—they should help with water stagnation problems.

Camden County recently turned on two fountains in the Collingswood section of the lake. Three more will be turned on soon, including two in the Haddon Township portion. They’ll run from 6 a.m. to 8 p.m. daily.

“Over the years, Newton Lake Park as experienced suffocating algae growth that has stemmed from the lack of circulation in its extended waterways,” Freeholder Jeffrey Nash, liaison to the Camden County Parks Department, said. “The overall stagnation in the water itself has created a prime environment for the green film to take over sections of the park and create an unappealing area that is being constricted by algae blooms.”

The green film was particularly aggressive this past summer, as a sickly pea green carpet covered the water for much of the season.

The new fountains will move the water and enhance the circulation, Nash said, with the goal of improving both water quality and aesthetics.

“As a freeholder, I have worked with the surrounding community for years to create a better park space in Newton Lake and these aerators are one of the many steps we’ve taken to achieve that goal,” he said.

The two currently operational aerators are closer to Lees Lane, one on each side of the children’s playground there. Two more aerators sit on the other side of the Lees Lane bridge on Haddon Township’s portion of the lake. An additional fountain, not yet operational, is tucked into Nichols Pond, the offshoot section of the lake that sits in Collingswood between Merrick, Bettlewood and Belmont avenues. That pond is particularly susceptible to the “green carpet,” as there is less water movement and more vegetation.

While Collingswood’s Knight Park also has aerators in some of its water bodies, the fountains are the first Camden County has installed in its 20 parks. The county spent $120,000 on the project.

Newton Lake Park spans 103.39 acres through Haddon Township, Collingswood and Oaklyn. The lake starts in earnest at Cuthbert Boulevard in Haddon Township and eventually runs into the Delaware River.

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