Sitting amid a swath of protected land on the northern edge of Morris County, the Oak Ridge Reservoir is the largest in a five-reservoir system big enough to hold 14.4 billion gallons of water for the city of Newark.

The watershed for the reservoir, which sits partially in Jefferson and partially in West Milford, has been protected from development since the state Legislature enacted a moratorium on building on watershed lands in 1988.

The reservoir will gain an added measure of protection under the Highlands protection law, passed by the Legislature on June 10, which includes the reservoir within a core preservation zone where building and development are sharply curtailed.

The reservoir "is not going to be very much impacted by the legislation" because of the moratorium on developing the surrounding land, which is owned by the city of Newark, said Ross Kushner, executive director of the Pequannock River Coalition. But he added that "the watershed moratorium wasn't etched in stone, so this kind of solidifies that (protection)."

The moratorium was meant to be temporary until legislation could be enacted to keep development and pollution from harming public water supplies. But it continued when that legislation never came to pass.

Anyone wanting to build on watershed land must go before a review board chaired by the commissioner of the state Department of Environmental Protection - and very few projects have been allowed to proceed, Kushner said.

The Oak Ridge reservoir, with a surface area of 482 acres and a capacity of 3.9 billion gallons, is the largest of five reservoirs owned by Newark in the Pequannock River watershed. Its watershed measures 27 square miles. The next largest is the Clinton reservoir, with a 3.5 billion gallon capacity and a surface area of 423 acres.

The five reservoirs are on the main stem or on tributaries of the Pequannock River. Newark owns 64 of the 98 square miles in the river's watershed, which stretches from Vernon and Hardyston at its north end to Jefferson, Rockaway, Kinnelon, Butler, Riverdale and Pequannock in the south.

The ownership of the remaining land is "extremely fragmented" among the state, counties and private landholders, Kushner said.

The legislation protecting the Highlands "was exactly what was needed if they want long-term protection for that water supply," he said. "It was the essential piece of legislation that was missing."

The Oak Ridge reservoir gets about 90 percent of its water from the Pequannock River, with the rest coming from small streams, Kushner said. The reservoir enjoys better protection from development-related pollution because of its elevation, he said.

"The Oak Ridge Reservoir sits fairly high in the system, and the lower you go, you see more impacts from development," he said. "As you go lower down, the Charlottesburg reservoir is more at risk."

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Chris Gosier may be reached at (973) 428-6667 or cgosier@gannett.com.

Copyright 2004 Daily Record.

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