Deal reached to bypass San Clemente dam
Peter Fimrite, Chronicle Staff Writer
Wednesday, January 13, 2010
(01-13) 18:22 PST San Francisco -- An obsolete dam that has blocked the historic migration of steelhead trout on the Carmel River for decades will be bypassed, according to an agreement between the government and a Monterey water company.The California American Water Company signed an agreement this week to split the cost of re-routing the river around the 106-foot tall San Clemente Dam, which has been choked with silt and virtually useless for years.
The $84 million project involves digging a new half-mile channel starting in 2013. The dam itself would presumably be removed at an unspecified future date, but the tons of sediment trapped behind it will be left in place, according to the plan.
The water company, which owns the dam, will come up with $50 million of the cost by raising the rates of its 110,000 customers in Monterey County. The rest of the money will be paid by federal and state agencies, including the Oakland-based California Coastal Conservancy.
The San Clemente Dam was built in 1921 and once provided drinking water throughout the Monterey Peninsula. It was declared unsafe by inspectors in 1991 and is now 90 percent silted up. In the late 1990s, state regulators declared that it was in danger of collapsing in an earthquake and spilling the 40 million gallons of water trapped behind its crumbling walls.
Picture from California Creeks http://cacreeks.com/carmel3.htm
Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2010/01/13/BAF41BHBSA.DTL#ixzz0cZCR2CUt
