Water Conservation Area 3 on:
[Wikipedia]
[Google]
[Amazon]
Water Conservation Area 3 (WCA-3) is the largest existing WCA covering a total of 915 square miles within Western Dade and Broward Counties. Lying southwest of WCA-2 and just north of Everglades National Park, WCA-3 is used primarily as an area to receive flood waters from adjacent areas and store them for beneficial municipal, urban, and agricultural uses. It was subdivided into WCA-3A and WCA-3B by way of the L-67 canal and levees as a safeguard against seepage into the aquifer.
Water Conservation Area 3 (WCA-3) is the largest existing WCA covering a total of 915 square miles within Western Dade and Broward Counties. Lying southwest of WCA-2 and just north of Everglades National Park, WCA-3 is used primarily as an area to receive flood waters from adjacent areas and store them for beneficial municipal, urban, and agricultural uses. It was subdivided into WCA-3A and WCA-3B by way of the L-67 canal and levees as a safeguard against seepage into the aquifer.
WCA-3A
WCA-3A makes up 786 square miles of the whole area and is responsible for delivering water to bothEverglades National Park
Everglades National Park is an American national park that protects the southern twenty percent of the original Everglades in Florida. The park is the largest tropical wilderness in the United States and the largest wilderness of any kind east ...
and Miami-Dade County. It is the only WCA that is not fully enclosed by levees. A gap left in the mid western side allows for overland flow into Big Cypress National Preserve
Big Cypress National Preserve is a United States National Preserve located in South Florida, about 45 miles (72 kilometers) west of Miami on the Atlantic coastal plain. The Big Cypress, along with Big Thicket National Preserve in Texas, becam ...
.It is also the home of multiple recreational and hunting lodges or camps.
WCA-3B
WCA-3B is the remaining 128 square miles located in the southeast corner of WCA-3. Its primary function is listed as recharging and maintaining groundwater levels in coastal areas to the east.Florida Department of Environmental Protection
The Florida Department of Environmental Protection (FDEP) is the Florida government agency responsible for environmental protection.
History
By the mid-1960s, when the federal government was becoming increasingly involved in initiatives desig ...
currently rates the water quality found there as POOR due to the introduction of nutrient-rich water from the northern end. The overwhelming presence of phosphorus in this water has resulted in the degradation of native sawgrass by invasive cattails
''Typha'' is a genus of about 30 species of monocotyledonous flowering plants in the family Typhaceae. These plants have a variety of common names, in British English as bulrush or reedmace, in American English as reed, cattail, or punks, in ...
. Once present, cattails prove to be quick to spread and difficult to eradicate.
On May 11,1996, ValuJet Flight 592
ValuJet Airlines Flight 592 was a regularly scheduled flight from Miami International Airport to Hartsfield–Jackson Atlanta International Airport. On May 11, 1996, the ValuJet Airlines McDonnell Douglas DC-9 operating the route crashed into t ...
crashed into WCA-3B, killing everyone on board.
See also
*Everglades
The Everglades is a natural region of tropical wetlands in the southern portion of the U.S. state of Florida, comprising the southern half of a large drainage basin within the Neotropical realm. The system begins near Orlando with the Kissim ...
* Everglades National Park
Everglades National Park is an American national park that protects the southern twenty percent of the original Everglades in Florida. The park is the largest tropical wilderness in the United States and the largest wilderness of any kind east ...
* Water Conservation Area 1
References
{{Reflist Water in Florida Water conservation in the United States Broward County, Florida Geography of Miami-Dade County, Florida