WMOD00414

• Title: Water and Choice in the Colorado River Basin
• Date: 5/1/1968
• Weather Modification - Doc Type: Report

THE SETTING 1:-1

The population of the basin (2.54 million in 1966*) has been increasing
rapidly. Arizona's population (1.74 million) increased by more than 130
percent from 1950 to 1966, more than five times the national rate. The
growth of earnings (204 percent in the interval 1950-1962) was more than
double the population growth (93 percent) during that period.
Throughout the basin, cities have grown up only in those areas that can
be irrigated, mined, or that hold special advantages as tourist or railroad
centers; recent population growth in these cities, however, reflects new
industry dependent on neither agriculture nor mineral resources. All the
larger cities are in the southern part of the basin. Phoenix, the largest
city, had an estimated metwpolitan-area population in 1966 of 838,000;
Tucson, 307,000; and Las Vegas, 232,000. Thl~ first two of these are
built, in part, in the valleys of streams that are nearly dry much of the
time and that cause heavy damage when they erratically and infrequently
claim their natural floodplains. Dry washes, urban flood hazard, and
federal protection projects go hand in hand.
Although not in the basin, the great and growing urban concentration
of the Los Angeles-San Diego-San Bernardino area (9.0 million) lies im-
mediately adjacent and is heavily dependent upon the Colorado River for
electric power and for water to supply homes and industry. Denver and
the Salt Lake basin also depend in part on diversions from the Colorado.

A GROWING ECONOMY

Farming, mining, and trade constituted the largest segments of the economy
many years ago. In recent years, the pattern of economic growth has
changed rapidly (Figure 5), featured by "footloose" industry. Phoenix il-
lustrates this new pattern. From 1960 to 1967, the population of the
metropolitan area increased 35 percent, mainly r'eflecting a net increase of
226 manufacturing firms (phoenix Newspapers, Inc., 1967). In 1967, the
single largest employer in the Phoenix area was an electronics firm. Of the
18 organizations having more than 1,000 employees, seven are electronics
firms, three are aircraft companies, three are public utilities, two are military
bases, one is an aluminum company, one is an apparel manufacturer, and one
is a printing and publishing establishment. Not one is directly related to
agriculture or dependent on water or other local natural resources.
The impact of new industry on the economy of the Phoenix area is shown
by the change in the income pattern from 1950 to 1966. In this period, in-

*Based on state and county estimates.