Lake Tahoe Dam
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Lake Tahoe Dam is a concrete gravity dam on the
Truckee River The Truckee River is a river in the U.S. states of California and Nevada. The river flows northeasterly and is long.U.S. Geological Survey. National Hydrography Dataset high-resolution flowline dataThe National Map accessed October 20, 2012 The ...
, at the outlet of
Lake Tahoe Lake Tahoe (; was, Dáʔaw, meaning "the lake") is a Fresh water, freshwater lake in the Sierra Nevada (U.S.), Sierra Nevada of the United States. Lying at , it straddles the state line between California and Nevada, west of Carson City, Nevad ...
in
Placer County, California Placer County ( ; Spanish for "sand deposit"), officially the County of Placer, is a county in the U.S. state of California. As of the 2020 census, the population was 404,739. The county seat is Auburn. Placer County is included in the Grea ...
. Tahoe Dam regulates the top six feet of Lake Tahoe, and distributes the water into Tahoe's primary outflow, the Truckee River. The dam is located in
Tahoe City Tahoe City (formerly Tahoe) is an unincorporated town in Placer County, California. Tahoe City is located on the shore of Lake Tahoe, at the outlet of the Truckee River. The site was surveyed in 1863, and Tahoe House was built in 1864. The Taho ...
and serves as the main storage facility for the U.S. Bureau of Reclamation's Newlands Project that also includes the
Lahontan Dam The Lahontan Dam is a dam situated on the Carson River in the Carson Desert between Carson City, Nevada and Fallon, Nevada in the United States. Its impoundment is known as the Lahontan Reservoir or Lake Lahontan. It is currently operated by ...
and two diversion dams, providing irrigation water for of cropland mainly in the
Lahontan Valley The Lahontan Valley is a basin in Churchill County, Nevada, United States. The valley is a landform of the central portion of the prehistoric Lake Lahontan's lakebed of 20,000-9,000 years ago. The valley and the adjacent Carson Sink represent a ...
of western
Nevada Nevada ( ; ) is a U.S. state, state in the Western United States, Western region of the United States. It is bordered by Oregon to the northwest, Idaho to the northeast, California to the west, Arizona to the southeast, and Utah to the east. N ...
. The present Lake Tahoe dam replaced an older, privately owned dam built in 1870 at roughly the same location. The dam was built between 1909 and 1913 and stands high and long, raising Lake Tahoe by up to . Outflows from the dam are regulated by a gated spillway with 17 bays, with a maximum release capacity of . It is situated 400 feet downstream from the lake's natural shore. This is meant to help hydraulic control during a dry season with low water levels. The reservoir receives water from a catchment of and has a maximum storage capacity of .


History


Early controversy

In the early 1860s, Russian born and San Francisco based engineer Alexis Waldemar Von Schmidt bought a large amount of land in the Tahoe-Truckee area with the hope of sending water westward to San Francisco via an aqueduct. He created the Lake Tahoe and San Francisco Water Works Company in 1865 in order to see his plan come to life, however Von Schmidt was shut down by California Legislature in 1870. Instead of allowing an aqueduct to be built from Tahoe to San Francisco, the California Legislature granted the Donner Lumber and Boom Company, which was then owned by Mark Hopkins and
Leland Stanford Amasa Leland Stanford (March 9, 1824June 21, 1893) was an American industrialist and politician. A member of the Republican Party, he served as the 8th governor of California from 1862 to 1863 and represented California in the United States Se ...
, the right to build a dam on Tahoe's outlet. A small dam was then built from lumber and rocks. However, this did not discourage Von Schmidt, who, in the following year, continued to push for the ability to divert water to San Francisco. He eventually proposed his idea to the San Francisco Board of Supervisors, which was to channel the water from the Truckee River to Squaw Valley, which would lead to the North Fork of the
American River , name_etymology = , image = American River CA.jpg , image_size = 300 , image_caption = The American River at Folsom , map = Americanrivermap.png , map_size = 300 , map_caption ...
, and then finally through an aqueduct towards San Francisco. This project, in total would have cost $10 million at the time (today roughly $200 million) and had been approved by the San Francisco city supervisors, but was ultimately shut down by the mayor of San Francisco, who was wary of the possible lawsuits over water rights which could come his way.


Newlands Reclamation Act

In 1892, newly-elected House of Representatives member from Nevada,
Francis G. Newlands Francis Griffith Newlands (August 28, 1846December 24, 1917) was a United States representative and Senator from Nevada and a member of the Democratic Party. A supporter of westward expansion, he helped pass the Newlands Reclamation Act of 19 ...
, began advocating for more irrigation in the western United States in order to further the United States' agricultural growth. His advocacy had begun when he first moved to Nevada in 1888 and began to dream up a new irrigation system for the west. Newlands called his project the Truckee Irrigation Project, which ultimately was unsuccessful as a private venture. However, although Newlands did not find success in his short career as an entrepreneur, his quest for more irrigation became part of the reason Newlands was voted into office. It was not until 1901, however, when
Theodore Roosevelt Theodore Roosevelt Jr. ( ; October 27, 1858 – January 6, 1919), often referred to as Teddy or by his initials, T. R., was an American politician, statesman, soldier, conservationist, naturalist, historian, and writer who served as the 26t ...
became President, that there was any real progress made towards implementing the irrigation systems. With President Roosevelt's support, Representative Newlands was finally able to successfully push his bill through. On June 17, 1902, Congress passed the
Newlands Reclamation Act The Reclamation Act (also known as the Lowlands Reclamation Act or National Reclamation Act) of 1902 () is a United States federal law that funded irrigation projects for the arid lands of 20 states in the American West. The act at first covere ...
, thus creating what is now known as the
United States Bureau of Reclamation The Bureau of Reclamation, and formerly the United States Reclamation Service, is a federal agency under the U.S. Department of the Interior, which oversees water resource management, specifically as it applies to the oversight and opera ...
(USBR). The first of five projects created from the Reclamation Act was the Truckee–Carson Project, later renamed the Newlands Project, as Representative Newlands had been the bills main figurehead. Construction for the Newlands Project began in 1903 and they quickly made progress on building the Derby Dam and the Truckee Canal.


Newlands Project

In 1909, the Newlands Project set out to obtain the rights to the Tahoe Dam, which at that point had been owned by Truckee River General Electric Company. Although an agreement was not fully reached until June 4, 1915, rights of ownership for Tahoe Dam were given to the US government. Rights to control Tahoe Dam and some 14 acres surrounding the outlet was purchased for a total of $139,500 by the federal government. Prior to this change of ownership, both the Truckee River General Electric and the USBR contributed to the replacement of the small original rock-filled wooden dam with a more sustainable concrete slab and buttress structure dam. Tahoe Dam was slightly modernized in 1987 by the Safety of Dams Program, and it is this version of the dam which still in operation today.    In total, the Newlands Project led to the creation of many irrigation systems within Nevada and California including: * Lake Tahoe Dam *
Lahontan Dam The Lahontan Dam is a dam situated on the Carson River in the Carson Desert between Carson City, Nevada and Fallon, Nevada in the United States. Its impoundment is known as the Lahontan Reservoir or Lake Lahontan. It is currently operated by ...
, reservoir, and power plant * Truckee Canal * Carson River Diversion Dam * Derby Diversion Dam


Paiute Tribe lawsuit

As the USBR stated intent to repair the Tahoe Dam in 1987 in order to enhance its seismic resistance, the Paiute Tribe took advantage of this occasion to file a lawsuit against the federal government. In what became the '' Pyramid Lake Paiute Tribe of Indians v. Secretary of the Interior Hodel,'' the Paiute Tribe fought against how specific operations of the dam negatively impacted Pyramid Lake's endangered cui-iu fish species. The main problem which the Paiute Tribe had identified was that part of the Truckee River naturally flows into Pyramid Lake within the Paiute Reservation. However, with irrigation interference from the U.S. Government, Pyramid Lake received less water than it needed for its ecosystem to thrive. It was found that the endangerment of the cui-ui was directly related to the amount of water within Pyramid Lake. The court decided on August 9, 1989 that water would be stored in the Stampede Reservoir for the purpose of releasing it into Pyramid Lake as needed to partially make up for what water was being lost within the irrigation systems created and sustained by the Newlands Project.


Local landmark

After having been built in the early 1900s, Tahoe Dam has become a local landmark for Tahoe City and the greater Tahoe-Truckee area. It was recognized on a national level and was listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the United States federal government's official list of districts, sites, buildings, structures and objects deemed worthy of preservation for their historical significance or "great artistic v ...
on March 25, 1981. Another landmark associated with Tahoe Dam would be the famed Fanny Bridge, a small two-lane bridge connecting North Shore and West Shore of Lake Tahoe, located in Tahoe City and directly across from Tahoe Dam.


See also

*
List of dams and reservoirs in California Following is a list of dams and reservoirs in California in a sortable table. There are over 1,400 named dams and 1,300 named reservoirs in the state of California. Dams in service :''Please add to this list from the below sources.'' Former ...
*
List of largest reservoirs of California This is a list of the largest reservoirs, or man-made lakes, in the U.S. state of California. All fifty-three reservoirs that contain over of water at maximum capacity are listed. This includes those formed by raising the level of natural lakes, ...
*
List of United States Bureau of Reclamation dams Following is a complete list of the approximately 340 dams owned by the United States Bureau of Reclamation as of 2008. The Bureau was established in July 1902 as the "United States Reclamation Service" and was renamed in 1923. The agency has ...


References

{{coord, 39.167213, -120.143926, format=dms, display=title, type:landmark Dams in California Dams completed in 1913 United States Bureau of Reclamation dams 1913 establishments in California National Register of Historic Places in Placer County, California