Colorado River Aqueduct Map

A few nice civil engineer articles images I found:

Colorado River Aqueduct Map


Image by Chuck “Caveman” Coker
The Colorado River Aqueduct begins at Lake Havasu, formed by Parker Dam, on the California-Arizona border, and carries water across the Mojave and Colorado deserts. It is owned and operated by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (MWD). The aqueduct is a major source of drinking water for much of Southern California.

The main portion of the aqueduct—between Parker Dam and Cajalco Reservoir—consists of two reservoirs, five pumping plants, 63 miles (101 km) of canals, 92 miles (148 km) of tunnels, and 84 miles (135 km) of buried conduit and siphons. Its capacity is 1.3 million acre-feet (1.6 km³) per year.

The MWD built the project for the Works Projects Administration (WPA) in eight years, from 1933-1941. Water first flowed in the aqueduct on January 7, 1939 when the intake pumps at Lake Havasu began operation to fill the first of the reservoirs in the Gene Basin. (See article reproduced below.)

William Mulholland thought up the idea and MWD Chief Engineer Frank E. Weymouth designed it. It was the largest public works project in southern California during the Great Depression—it employed 30,000 people over an eight-year period and as many as 10,000 at one time.

In 1992, the American Society of Civil Engineers (ASCE) as one of the Seven Wonders of the American Engineering World.

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Update: This image was used on Ron’s Log on January 9, 2009.

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First Water Flows In Colorado Aqueduct
Intake pumping plant goes into regular service Jan. 7 and starts filling Gene Basin reservoir

The first water will flow in a section of the Colorado River Aqueduct on Jan. 7 when the Intake pumping plant, having successfully completed preliminary tests, will be put into regular operation.

The Intake plant is the first to be completed of five pumping stations along the aqueduct line. It will take water from the reservoir formed in the Colorado River by Parker Dam, lift it up the canyon wall to a height of 291 ft., and deliver it into a 2-mile tunnel leading to the Gene Basin reservoir.

Ceremonies marking the first regular operation of any part of the aqueduct will be held Jan. 7 at the Gene Basin reservoir.

The entire metropolitan aqueduct system is now about 90 per cent complete, with all major features scheduled for completion by the latter part of 1939. At that time aqueduct water will be delivered into Cajalco Reservoir, the terminal storage basin at the west end of the main aqueduct, and it is expected that water will be distributed to cities in the district before the end of the year.

Source: Engineering News-Record: A Weekly Journal of Civil Engineering and Construction Practice. Volume 122. January to June, 1939. Page 17.

You can download a PDF version of this book here. This guy has a hardcover first-edition of this books for sale: RonaldRH.

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The U.S. Department of the Interior‘s Bureau of Reclamation‘s Lower Colorado Region has a brochure about the Parker Dam and Powerplant.

colorado-river-aqueduct-map

San Francisco: Golden Gate Bridge


Image by wallyg
The Golden Gate Bridge spans 8,981 feet across the Golden Gate, the opening of the San Francisco Bay onto the Pacific Ocean, connecting San Francisco on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula to Marin County. Designed by engineer Joseph Strauss and architect Irving Morrow, it was the longest suspension bridge span in the world when it opened on May 27, 1937. It has since been surpassed by eight other bridges, but still has the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States after the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York.

Before the bridge was built, the only practical route across the Golden Gate was by boat, which held San Francisco’s growth rate below the national average. However, many experts believed that the 6,700-foot strait could not be bridged. It had strong swirling tides, strong winds, and reached depths of 500-feet at its center.

In 1916, former engineering student James Wilkins wrote an article with a proposed design for a crossing in the San Francisco Bulletin. The City Engineer estimated the cost at an impractical 0 million and challenged bridge engineers to reduce costs. Joseph Strauss, an ambitious but modestly accomplished engineer, responded with a plan for bookend cantilevers connected by a central suspension segment, which he promised could be built for million. Strauss spent the better part of the next decade drumming up support and construction began on January 5, 1933.

As chief engineer in charge, Strauss, with an eye towards self promotion downplayed the contributions of his collaborators who were largely responsible for the bridge’s final form Architect Irving Morrow designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme and Art Deco elements, and used the International Orange color as a sealant. And Charles Alton Ellis, collaborating remotely with Leon Moisseiff, was the principal engineer, producing the basic structural design, introducing Moisseiff’s "deflection theory" by which a thin, flexible roadway would flex in the wind, greatly reducing stress by transmitting forces via suspension cables to the bridge towers

In 2007, the Golden Gate Bridge was ranked #5 on the AIA 150 America’s Favorite Architecture list.

California Historical Landmark No. 974, San Francisco Landmark No. 222 (5/21/1999)

San Francisco: Golden Gate Bridge


Image by wallyg
The Golden Gate Bridge spans 8,981 feet across the Golden Gate, the opening of the San Francisco Bay onto the Pacific Ocean, connecting San Francisco on the northern tip of the San Francisco Peninsula to Marin County. Designed by engineer Joseph Strauss and architect Irving Morrow, it was the longest suspension bridge span in the world when it opened on May 27, 1937. It has since been surpassed by eight other bridges, but still has the second longest suspension bridge main span in the United States after the Verrazano-Narrows Bridge in New York.

Before the bridge was built, the only practical route across the Golden Gate was by boat, which held San Francisco’s growth rate below the national average. However, many experts believed that the 6,700-foot strait could not be bridged. It had strong swirling tides, strong winds, and reached depths of 500-feet at its center.

In 1916, former engineering student James Wilkins wrote an article with a proposed design for a crossing in the San Francisco Bulletin. The City Engineer estimated the cost at an impractical 0 million and challenged bridge engineers to reduce costs. Joseph Strauss, an ambitious but modestly accomplished engineer, responded with a plan for bookend cantilevers connected by a central suspension segment, which he promised could be built for million. Strauss spent the better part of the next decade drumming up support and construction began on January 5, 1933.

As chief engineer in charge, Strauss, with an eye towards self promotion downplayed the contributions of his collaborators who were largely responsible for the bridge’s final form Architect Irving Morrow designed the overall shape of the bridge towers, the lighting scheme and Art Deco elements, and used the International Orange color as a sealant. And Charles Alton Ellis, collaborating remotely with Leon Moisseiff, was the principal engineer, producing the basic structural design, introducing Moisseiff’s "deflection theory" by which a thin, flexible roadway would flex in the wind, greatly reducing stress by transmitting forces via suspension cables to the bridge towers

In 2007, the Golden Gate Bridge was ranked #5 on the AIA 150 America’s Favorite Architecture list.

California Historical Landmark No. 974, San Francisco Landmark No. 222 (5/21/1999)