A Central Texas landowner and other conservationists are dreading the development of a resort complex that could forever alter an undisturbed area.
What's happening?
The Mirasol Springs luxury resort and housing tract will sit on 1,400 acres, with an eco hotel of 70 rooms plus 30 cottages and 39 residential lots. Though about 1,000 acres will become a conservation easement, the site threatens Roy Creek Canyon, Texas Monthly reported.
Part of the area, perhaps "one of the last remaining ecosystems" in the state, according to the Austin American-Statesman, has been in Lew Adams' family since the 1940s. The creek and springs feed the Pedernales River, which ran dry in each of the last two summers. Uphill, Mirasol Springs has a permit to pump 100,000 gallons from the river every day, except during droughts, per Texas Monthly.
"What are we going to do with this place if the creek were to go dry? What is the value then?" Adams said. "All the cypress trees will start to diminish; this whole deciduous forest, which relies on [the springs], could be endangered."
He and others are also worried about pollution from visitors and wastewater.
Why is this important?
The Lower Colorado River Authority, which approved the Mirasol Springs contract, in February implemented water restrictions because of a severe drought. Lake Travis and Lake Buchanan were down to 847,000 acre-feet of water combined, or about 42% capacity. They've bounced back after recent storms to 1,047,153 acre-feet but are still at just 39.4% and 71% capacity.
"The alarms went off when people in this area first heard about Mirasol Springs," Hill Country Alliance co-founder Christy Muse said. "To their credit, the Mirasol people paused and wanted to hear what locals had to say. They thought they were doing something really great right off the bat and quickly learned that a lot of people around here don't feel the same way."
Muse is "haunted" by what will happen to the area once it's developed because of the drought and rising global temperatures, Texas Monthly reported, noting the "dry line" — where dry air from the Western United States meets moist air from the East — has moved 140 miles east over the last 100 years, leaving the Austin area in the dust.
"There is a lot about this that I personally like, but the site they chose is just so fragile that it makes things really challenging and not just for Roy Creek," she said. "The conservation community in this area is deploying every strategy we can think of to benefit water recharge and the flow in the Pedernales, and pulling water out of the river that makes up 25 percent of the flow into Lake Travis just doesn't seem logical."
What's being done about the development?
A representative of the development told Texas Monthly it will collect rainwater from every rooftop on the property and that deed restrictions will ban herbicides, pesticides, nonnative plants, septic systems, and private wells. And after public outcry in 2022, the site was scaled back, with a decrease in houses from 55.
Still, it's not enough for those who hold the Hill Country and its iconic springs near and dear. That's because the only way to preserve such natural features is to leave them in pristine condition, in part by not pumping groundwater, which feeds the springs.
Though officials have said Mirasol Springs won't extract groundwater unless the LCRA contract changes and, later, that it would only do so a quarter of the time, it has asked to pump 27.6 million gallons per year, nearly as much as its surface water allotment (35 million gallons, per the Statesman.
"Roy Creek is not necessarily unique on its face," hydrogeologist Doug Wierman told Texas Monthly. "There are a lot of these springs tucked away in the Hill Country, but as land is partitioned, developments added, and more groundwater pumped, they're disappearing."
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