Texas leaders create first new lakes since 1980s to accommodate booming population

LADONIA, Texas — Ed Motley stands in the middle of a large field, about an hour and a half northeast of Dallas, and looks on as heavy machinery pours concrete and workers build up the dirt embankments of the 16,000-acre construction site.

If you’ve ever wondered what it looks like to build a lake, he says this is just a glimpse.

“They’ve been placing this concrete for about the last nine months,” said Motley, the project manager for Lake Ralph Hall.

Nine months is just a small paragraph in the story of Motley’s lake, though. The longtime engineer first heard the name Lake Ralph Hall back around the turn of the millennium when he was tapped by state leaders to build a new lake for the Upper Trinity Water District – the district serving some of the fastest growing portions of the Dallas-Fort Worth area.