FLOOD10350

• Designation Number: 578
• County: Delta
• Community: Orchard City
• Stream Name: Surface Creek, Cedar Run and Tongue Creek
• Title: Floodplain Information Report: City of Orchard City, CO
• Date: 9/1/2004
• Prepared For: Orchard City and CWCB
• Prepared By: Love and Associates
• Floodplain - Doc Type: Floodplain Report/Masterplan

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Tongue Creek has a drainage area of approximately 152 square miles. Its headwaters is
located within Grand Mesa National Forest. Elevations in the basin range from
approximately 11,100 feet msl at the divide to 5040 feet msl at the southern City
boundary.

The Cedar Run drainage basin originates approximately 2.3 miles northeast of the
northern City limits. Its drainage area is approximately 4.7 square miles, and its
elevation ranges from approximately 7160 at the divide to 5040 feet msl at its confluence '
with North Fork Gunnison River.

Floodin2 Problems and Floodin2 History

There are few flood events recorded within Orchard City. Failure of the Fruit Growers
Reservoir in 1937 caused a flood along Alfalfa Run located near the eastern boundary of
the City. The largest flood of record on Surface Creek was recorded upstream of Orchard
City in the Town of Edgewater at USGS Gage 09134500. This flood was recorded on
May 26, 1942, was the result of snowmelt, and the flood peak was about 1310 cfs (Elliott
et ai, 1982).

Previous Studies

Flood peak discharges for the 10-, 50-, 100-, and 500-year events for Surface Creek and
portions of Cedar Run were originally calculated by MSM (MSM Consultants, Inc.,
1979) using USGS regression equations, according to the PIS. These flood peaks were
used for floodplain delineation on the Orchard City FIRM and FBFM (FEMA, 1981).
The 1981 FBFM is reproduced on Figures 3A through 3F. Flood peak estimates from
the FIS are reproduced in Table 1.

Community Response to the CWCB Desi2nation and Approval Process

A letter from the CWCB was transmitted to the City of Orchard City regarding the
Board's proposed action for designation and approval of Orchard City floodplain
information. The town was receptive to the Board's proposed designation action and sent
an official letter requesting that the CWCB designate and approve the floodplain
information currently available to the community. A copy of the request letter is
included in the Appendix of this report. In addition, the community was contacted during
the study process to obtain data and general information.

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