BOARD00444

• Board Meeting Date: 1/11/1961
• Description: Minutes
• Board Meetings - Doc Type: Meeting

I

NAVAJO UNIT: With peak placement of earth materials reaching more
than 1,000,000 cubic yards in August and nearly a
million yards in September, the total volume placed in Navajo Dam
now exceeds 17,000,000 cubic yards, or abou~ 65 percent of the com-
pleted structure. Navajo Dam construction is well ahead -- perhaps
20 percent -- of the contract time which calls for completion in
March 1963. About 9,000,000 cubic yards of earth and rockfill re-
main to be placed. With favorable weather conditions and a place-
ment rate comparable to that achieved in the last year, it now
appears that Navajo Dam will be topped out in December 1961 and the
remaining work completed on the dam by March 1962 -- or one year
ahead of schedule. At the present time, Navajo Dam is more than
70 percent completed in about one half of the prime contract time.

CURECANTI UNIT: As you know, construction funds were appropriated
for FY 1961 to begin work on the Blue Mesa Dam.
An office has been opened at Gunnison, Colorado, and preconstruc-
tion surveys and detailed borrow pit explorations are underway and
on schedule. A contract has been entered into with the State of
Colorado for the early relocation of U. S. Highway 50 around the
Blue Mesa Damsite and through the reservoir area, since a portion
of the old highway will be flooded at Sapinero when the Gunnison
River is diverted at the damsite. The State plans to award the
relocation in February 1961 with a completion date set for June
1962. The 18-month highway construction period will be required
since two large bridges must be built -- one across the deep Lake
Fork which joins the Gunnison River near Sapinero and one across
the reservoir farther upstream. The prime contract for construc-
tion of the Blue Mesa Dam will be awarded in March 1962.

TRANSMISSION SYSTEM: The construction appropriations for FY 1961
included funds to build certain Colorado
River Storage Project transmission lines. They are the l38-kv
Flaming Gorge (Utah)-Oak Creek (Colorado) wood-pole lines and the
230-kv Glen Canyon (Arizona)-Curecanti (Colorado) steel tower lines.

I

All interested parties were in agreement that these lines
should be built by the Bureau of Reclamation under either an all-
Federal system or the private utilities proposal. The bids opened
on December 6 for construction of the Flaming Gorge to Vernal link
of the Flaming Gorge-Oak Creek line were rejected. However. pre-
construction work is being completed and on December 30. invitations
for bids were issued for construction of the Flaming Gorge-Oak
Creek line. preconstruction surveys continued on the Glen Canyon-
Curecanti line.