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The Thor n transfer case back a dozen years when the growing suburb immediately north of Denver devel- oped complex plans for its so-called "Northern Project." Incorporated in 1956, Thornton was started a few years earlier as a working-class community where returning veterans could find affordable housing. The city depended on water produced from wells along the South Platte River and Clear Creek yield- ing a total of 26,000 acre feet. Located downstream from almost every other metro-area water User, however, Thornton officials have traditionally been concerned about water quality. According to Thornton, the quality of water also affected the quantity of water available for Thornton's municipal and industrial use, After meeting Safe Drinking Water Act Standards, Thornton officials claimed only 10,000 af would be reliably available during a dry year. Seeking supplemental sources of higher- quality water, Thornton joined other metro-area water providers in the mid- 1980s to pursue approval and construction of the Two Forks Dam proposal. However, because of concerns over excessive costs and environmental issues, Thornton decided to pursue other plans. The suburb settled on the "Northern 1m SPRING 1997 WATERNEWS Project," an ort every bit as ambitious as Thornton's plan to gtow to a city of 379,000 people by he year 2050. Now estimated to cost $4 million, the project would deliver water t() ormon through the construction of a comp x series of diversions, pump stations ant ipelines. Work actively began in late 1 when Thornton quietly spent $55 milliol buying 103 northern Colorado irrigated far encompassing more than 21,000 acres. Thornton's intention ultimately is to dry up some 18,000 acres of irrigated farmland and remove the watet. Through this acquisition, Thornton also bought more than 47 percent of the out- standing shares of the Water Supply and Storage Company. One of the oldest and most established of all irrigation companies in northern Colorado, the Water Supply and Storage Company owns senior water rights in the Colorado, Laramie, Michigan and Poudre River basins. Those rights include the Grand River al,d Skyline ditch- es and a portion of the Latamie-Poudre Timnel. Thornton intends to transfer those Water Supply and Stotage Company water rights from irrigation to municipal use. The city's plans first surfaced pub- licly in the spring of 1986 when newspapers learned of Thornton's farm and water buying plan. The effort became official on the last day of 1986 when Thornron officials filed three separate applications in Division 1 Water Court seeking diversion and exchange rights on borh the Poudre and South Platte Rivers as well as on the Larimer COUnty Canal. A fourth filing was made in 1987 seeking changes of those water rights in the Water Supply and Stor- age Company and Jackson Ditch Company, which Thornton had acquired, Because they were all parr of the same project the four filings were consolidated for trial before the Division 1 Water Court in Greeley. Statements of opposition were filed by 49 objectors, although only 10 remained by the time the case came before the Water Court on Aug. 7, 1991. The trial con- sumed 57 days through April 15, 1992. A memorandum of decision was issued by the ourt on Aug. 16, 1993, with the 88-page urt decree issued Feb. 18, 1994. e Water Court in that decree con- firm Thornton's conditional water rights, and al imposed numerous conditions on the exer . se of those rights as well as on the change of ater rights in an effort to pre- vent injury northern Colorado water users, Appeais 0 the Colorado Supreme Court then wet filed by Thornton with cross appeals the filed by several objectors. The court heard or 1 arguments on Oct. 17, 1995, and issued its nal ruling a year later on Oct. 15, 1996.b