Keweenaw Waters Resort celebrates campground opening

HOUGHTON, Mich. (WLUC) - The Keweenaw Waters Resort campground is officially open for business.

“What’s it like to see something you spent a lot of years of your life trying to work on, and do it?” Keweenaw Waters Resort Owner Derek Bradway said. “It’s absolutely amazing to do.”

A ribbon-cutting ceremony was held for the campground on Tuesday morning.

The resort has come a long way in three years since Bradway began construction. It was once part of the Torch Lake Superfund Site. Because of contamination from mining and smelting, it was listed under the Environmental Protection Agency’s National Priorities List in 1986.

Now, the 89-site campground features cabins, a dock, and a children’s playground. Bradway worked with the Department of Environment, Great Lakes and Energy and the Environmental Protection Agency to make the site safe.

“Our team did all of the work, in coordination with the EPA, to assess what needed to be cleaned up, to drive the cleanup effort,” EGLE Director Philip Roos said.

“You can see right down here the hardening that’s gone into the shoreline to make sure there’s nothing getting into the water from sub-surface,” EPA Region 5 Administrator Anne Vogel said. “You can take core samples here to make sure there are no chemicals of concern in the fill, so that’s how we know.”

Work at the resort is not finished, however.

“We’re still finishing off a lot of our shoreline activity,” Bradway added. “There’s still a splash pad that goes in for the kiddos. Eventually, we’re going to have a nature boardwalk that takes us through the lowlands and across Cole’s Creek.”

Bradway also says only half of the resort cabins have been built, with the other half being constructed over the next few years.

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