The Platte Canyon is a deep, narrow, scenic gorge on the

South Platte River The South Platte River is one of the two principal tributaries of the Platte River. Flowing through the U.S. states of Colorado and Nebraska, it is itself a major river of the American Midwest and the American Southwest/Mountain West. It ...

in the

Rocky Mountains The Rocky Mountains, also known as the Rockies, are a major mountain range and the largest mountain system in North America. The Rocky Mountains stretch in straight-line distance from the northernmost part of western Canada, to New Mexico ...

Colorado Colorado (, other variants) is a state in the Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It encompasses most of the Southern Rocky Mountains, as well as the northeastern portion of the Colorado Plateau and the western edge of the ...

. The canyon is southwest of

Denver Denver () is a consolidated city and county, the capital, and most populous city of the U.S. state of Colorado. Its population was 715,522 at the 2020 census, a 19.22% increase since 2010. It is the 19th-most populous city in the Unit ...

on the border between Jefferson and

Douglas Douglas may refer to: People * Douglas (given name) * Douglas (surname) Animals *Douglas (parrot), macaw that starred as the parrot ''Rosalinda'' in Pippi Longstocking * Douglas the camel, a camel in the Confederate Army in the American Civil ...

counties. The canyon is at the entrance to the mountains, where the South Platte emerges through the

Rampart Range The Rampart Range is a mountain range in Douglas, El Paso, and Teller counties, Colorado. It is part of the Front Range of the Rocky Mountains. The range is almost entirely public land within the Pike National Forest The Pike National Forest ...

through the hogbacks onto

Eastern Plains The Eastern Plains of Colorado refers to a region of the U.S. state of Colorado east of the Rocky Mountains and east of the population centers of the Front Range. Geography The Eastern Plains are part of the High Plains, which are the wester ...

. The lower narrow section is sometimes called Waterton Canyon, referring to Waterton, Colorado.

Geography

The term Platte Canyon is used varyingly to apply to the entire section of the South Platte and the North Fork South Platte in the mountains between

South Park ''South Park'' is an American animated sitcom created by Trey Parker and Matt Stone and developed by Brian Graden for Comedy Central. The series revolves around four boysStan Marsh, Kyle Broflovski, Eric Cartman, and Kenny McCormickand ...

and the eastern plains. It also is often applied to the communities along the North Fork near Bailey. The narrowest part of the canyon is a remote and roadless gorge (Waterton Canyon) approximately 8 miles (13 km) long, at its lower extremity between the hamlet of South Platte and Kassler, where it emerges from the mountains. In this section, the canyon has walls that rise approximately 1000 ft (300 m) from the river bed. The river drops from an elevation of approximately 6100 ft at South Platte at the head of the gorge to approximately 5500 ft at the canyon mouth. In this area is a

diversion dam A diversion dam is a dam that diverts all or a portion of the flow of a river from its natural course. Diversion dams do not generally impound water in a reservoir; instead, the water is diverted into an artificial water course or canal, whic ...

that backs up water in the South Platte River, allowing some of it to be sent down the

High Line Canal The High Line Canal (HLC) is a man-made waterway, used for irrigation and recreation, that serves the Denver-Aurora metropolitan area. It begins at a diversion dam on the South Platte River, some above the mouth of Waterton Canyon. From its headg ...

Railroad

TotallyFreeImages com-278960-Standard-preview (cropped)

In the middle and late 1870s, the

Denver, South Park and Pacific Railroad The Denver, South Park, and Pacific Railroad (later called the Denver, Leadville and Gunnison Railway) was a historic narrow gauge railroad that operated in Colorado in the western United States in the late 19th century. The railroad opened up t ...

constructed the first railroad through the canyon and through the valley of the North Fork to

and eventually to

Leadville The City of Leadville is a statutory city that is the county seat, the most populous community, and the only incorporated municipality in Lake County, Colorado, United States. The city population was 2,602 at the 2010 census and an estimated ...

and Gunnison. The line was initially a

narrow gauge A narrow-gauge railway (narrow-gauge railroad in the US) is a railway with a track gauge narrower than standard . Most narrow-gauge railways are between and . Since narrow-gauge railways are usually built with tighter curves, smaller structu ...

, and was later acquired by the

Colorado and Southern Railway The Colorado and Southern Railway was an American Class I railroad in the western United States that operated independently from 1898 to 1908, then as part of the Chicago, Burlington and Quincy Railroad until it was absorbed into the Burling ...

. Service on the line was terminated in 1937.

Potential dam

In the late 1920s, the Denver Board of Water Commissioners proposed building a dam to inundate the canyon, but the request was turned down by the Public Utilities Commission. A 1.7 miles section of Waterton Canyon was inundated by the Strontia Springs Reservoir, completed in 1983 as part of the

Foothills Project Foothills or piedmont are geographically defined as gradual increases in elevation at the base of a mountain range, higher hill range or an upland area. They are a transition zone between plains and low relief hills and the adjacent topogra ...

for water diversion. {{Coord, 39, 29, 06, N, 105, 06, 20, W, display=title Canyons and gorges of Colorado Landforms of Douglas County, Colorado Landforms of Jefferson County, Colorado