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The Gunnison Knot
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Last modified
1/26/2010 4:41:50 PM
Creation date
8/3/2009 11:21:18 AM
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Water Supply Protection
File Number
8230.2D
Description
Related News Articles
State
CO
Basin
Colorado Mainstem
Water Division
4
Author
George Sibley
Title
The Gunnison Knot
Water Supply Pro - Doc Type
News Article/Press Release
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, Colorado Central Magazine November 1999 Page 13 <br />Page 7 of 10 <br />in which natural resources were converted into goods, was just being replaced by a"new utilitarianism," <br />in which natural resources in place were a necessary setting for the local economies. <br />Looking at the homes, vehicles, and general urban baggage that the new immigrants have brought to the <br />non-urban West, it is hard to say that the modern destination resort is any more "environmentally clean" <br />than traditional mining or logging operations. It may just spread the mess of a swarming population <br />rather than concentrating it the way a mine does. <br />This change is, however, beginning to have a significant effect on the legal, political, and economic <br />structures underlying the way water is pushed around in the affected parts of the West. Most of these <br />changes stem from the fact that, for people oriented toward the appreciation of natural beauty and <br />outdoor recreation, the best place for water is in the rivers and streams, rather than spread out over the <br />surrounding land -- or taken completely out of the watershed, to some distant city. This is partially an <br />environmentalist position: it undeniably alters aquatic and riparian ecosystems to dam rivers or divert <br />the bulk of their water out of stream. <br />But it is also a utilitarian position with economic rationales. Tourism, resortism, and outdoor recreation <br />all depend on streams and rivers with healthy (or at least healthy-looking) flows in them. River rafting <br />has become an "industrial recreation" that is beginning to rival downhill skiing for popularity in the <br />West. More than 400,000 people went down the Upper Arkansas in rubber rafts last summer, and rafting <br />on the Taylor and Gunnison Rivers is now a major growth industry in the Upper Gunnison. <br />This changing perception of where a river's water is most valuable led, statewide in Colorado, to <br />"minimum instream flow" legislation in 1973, whereby no river can be drawn down through diversion <br />beyond a minimum flow necessary "to preserve the natural environment to a reasonable degree." <br />More important, but also more vague in terms of tested practice -- the old assumption about beneficial <br />uses has been modified. The law now grants that, so long as the water claimed is being controlled in <br />some way by the user, water claims for in-stream uses (for recreation, wildlife, etc.) can be perfected. <br />A"reform" group in the Upper Gunnison River Water Conservancy went to work on exploiting these <br />changes. In 1975, the Bureau of Reclamation and the Uncompaghre Valley Water Users Association <br />agreed to a plan proposed by the UGRWCD to, as it were, reconstruct the Taylor River. By that plan, the <br />UVWLJA could store their Taylor River water, through a crediting system, in Blue Mesa Reservoir, on <br />its way down to the Gunnison Tunnel. <br />This "1975 Agreement" meant that LJVWUA water could be moved from Taylor Reservoir to Blue <br />Mesa on a schedule that kept the Taylor River below the dam running like a river rather than an on-and- <br />off irrigation ditch. This is a complex and somewhat fragile agreement, but its consequences were <br />significant: full restoration of the Taylor River fishery was possible, as well as the beginning of rafting <br />and kayaking operations. <br />But see how the Knot builds. <br />The UGRWCD then took the "1975 Agreement" one better. They applied for water rights on a second <br />filling of Taylor Reservoir -- meaning that, once the UVWUA's 100,000 acre-feet-plus had been moved <br />through Taylor Dam to Blue Mesa, the UGRWCD would get to run a second 100,000 acre-feet-plus <br />through the dam "to enhance fishery and recreational uses in the Taylor and Gunnison Rivers above <br />Blue Mesa Reservoir." The water-law modifications that allowed in-stream uses to be considered <br />"beneficial" made this possible. The dam that had destroyed the river was now the control structure that <br />http://www.cozine.com/archive/cc 1999/00690133.htm 7/9/2003
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