Knolls, Utah
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Knolls is an
unincorporated community An unincorporated area is a parcel of land that is not governed by a local general-purpose municipal corporation. (At p. 178.) They may be governed or serviced by an encompassing unit (such as a county) or another branch of the state (such as th ...
in north-central Tooele County,
Utah Utah is a landlocked state in the Mountain states, Mountain West subregion of the Western United States. It is one of the Four Corners states, sharing a border with Arizona, Colorado, and New Mexico. It also borders Wyoming to the northea ...
, United States.


Description

The community is located in
Great Salt Lake Desert The Great Salt Lake Desert (colloquially referred to as the West Desert) is a large dry lake in northern Utah, United States, between the Great Salt Lake The Great Salt Lake is the largest saltwater lake in the Western Hemisphere and the ei ...
in the western portion of the state, close to the
Utah Test and Training Range The Utah Test and Training Range (UTTR) is a Department of Defense military testing and training area located in Utah's West Desert, approximately west of Salt Lake City, Utah. UTTR is currently the largest contiguous block of over-land superso ...
. Exit 41 on
Interstate 80 Interstate 80 (I-80) is an east–west transcontinental freeway that crosses the United States from San Francisco, California, to Teaneck, New Jersey, in the New York metropolitan area. The highway was designated in 1956 as one of the ori ...
(I‑80) provides access to Knolls. Prior to the building of I‑80, Knolls was serviced by
U.S. Route 40 U.S. Route 40 or U.S. Highway 40 (US 40), also known as the Main Street of America (a nickname shared with U.S. Route 66), is a major east–west United States Highway traveling across the United States from the Mountain States to the Mid- ...
and was the eastern terminus of the
Wendover Cut-off The Wendover Cut-off, also called the Wendover Road or Wendover Route, is a two-lane highway in the western part of Tooele County, Utah, Tooele County in the U.S. state of Utah. Stretching from Wendover, UT, Wendover to Knolls, Utah, Knolls acr ...
. During the 1970s and up until 1985 (possibly longer) one family owned and operated the entire town, consisting of a towing service, a small convenience store, a gas station, and a small motel. There was no water on site, and water had to be trucked in by a small tank truck. The town was for sale for a relatively small amount in 1985. There is photo evidence of a small tavern at one time. There is little visible evidence that there was ever any town, buildings, or gas station left. Knolls is located in a nearly uninhabited desert area, approximately east of the
Bonneville Salt Flats The Bonneville Salt Flats are a densely packed salt pan in Tooele County in northwestern Utah, United States. A remnant of the Pleistocene Lake Bonneville, it is the largest of many salt flats west of the Great Salt Lake. It is public land ma ...
and west of
Salt Lake City Salt Lake City, often shortened to Salt Lake or SLC, is the capital and most populous city of the U.S. state of Utah. It is the county seat of Salt Lake County, the most populous county in the state. The city is the core of the Salt Lake Ci ...
. The landscape contains mud flats, salt flats, and
gypsum Gypsum is a soft sulfate mineral composed of calcium sulfate Hydrate, dihydrate, with the chemical formula . It is widely mined and is used as a fertilizer and as the main constituent in many forms of plaster, drywall and blackboard or sidewalk ...
sand dune A dune is a landform composed of wind- or water-driven sand. It typically takes the form of a mound, ridge, or hill. An area with dunes is called a dune system or a dune complex. A large dune complex is called a dune field, while broad, flat ...
s. Much of the surrounding land is owned by the
Bureau of Land Management The Bureau of Land Management (BLM) is an agency within the United States Department of the Interior responsible for administering federal lands, U.S. federal lands. Headquartered in Washington, D.C., the BLM oversees more than of land, or one ...
and is maintained as an
off highway vehicle An off-road vehicle (ORV), also known as an off-highway vehicle (OHV), overland vehicle or adventure vehicle, is a type of transportation specifically engineered to navigate unpaved roads and surfaces. These include trails, forest roads, and ...
park, known as the Knolls Recreation Area. Knolls is the site of one place listed on the
National Register of Historic Places The National Register of Historic Places (NRHP) is the Federal government of the United States, United States federal government's official United States National Register of Historic Places listings, list of sites, buildings, structures, Hist ...
: the GAPA Launch Site, which is a concrete
bunker A bunker is a defensive military fortification designed to protect people and valued materials from falling bombs, artillery, or other attacks. Bunkers are almost always underground, in contrast to blockhouses which are mostly above ground. T ...
and
missile A missile is an airborne ranged weapon capable of self-propelled flight aided usually by a propellant, jet engine or rocket motor. Historically, 'missile' referred to any projectile that is thrown, shot or propelled towards a target; this ...
launch pad A launch pad is an above-ground facility from which a rocket-powered missile or space vehicle is vertically launched. The term ''launch pad'' can be used to describe just the central launch platform (mobile launcher platform), or the entire c ...
where the first Ground to Air Pilotless Aircraft missile was successfully tested in 1946. The site is marked by a placard installed by the Utah State History division. Knolls is also the site of a
hazardous waste Hazardous waste is waste that must be handled properly to avoid damaging human health or the environment. Waste can be hazardous because it is Toxicity, toxic, Chemical reaction, reacts violently with other chemicals, or is Corrosion, corrosive, ...
dump site known as Grassy Mountain. The community is named for the many knolls in the area.


Climate

The Great Salt Lake Desert experiences a desert climate with hot summers and cold winters. The desert is an excellent example of a
cold desert climate The desert climate or arid climate (in the Köppen climate classification ''BWh'' and ''BWk'') is a dry climate sub-type in which there is a severe excess of evaporation over precipitation. The typically bald, rocky, or sandy surfaces in desert ...
, rare outside of North America. The desert's elevation, above sea level, makes temperatures cooler than lower elevation deserts, such as the Mojave. Due to the high elevation and aridity, temperatures drop sharply after sunset. Summer nights are comfortably cool. Winter highs are generally above freezing, and winter nights are bitterly cold, with temperatures often dropping close to zero.


See also


References


External links

{{authority control Unincorporated communities in Tooele County, Utah Unincorporated communities in Utah Great Salt Lake Desert