FLOOD07777

• County: Statewide
• Community: Southern California
• Basin: Statewide
• Title: Urban Sprawl and Flooding in Southern California
• Date: 1/1/1970
• Prepared By: USGS
• Floodplain - Doc Type: Educational/Technical/Reference Information

.ailroads, which had received emergency repair
after being cut during the first phase of the
storm, were severely damaged as a result of
repeated attack by the waters of Cajon Creek.
Nor were homes spared by the deluge; in the
town of Cucamonga alone, nooding caused the
evacuation of 1,000 persons. Farther
downstream, near the junction of the San
Bernardino, Riverside, and Orange County lines,
the Santa Ana River was effectively controlled
by storage in the Prado nood-control basin. and
released nows were within the capacity of the
river channel downstream through the populous
areas of Orange County.

Figure 3.-Result of landslide (mudslide) in Glendora,
January 26. Water has cut a channel through the
mudslide. Photograph courtesy of Los Angeles
Times.

eigure 4.-Street flooding in EI Segundo. Photograph
courtesy of Police Department, city of El Segundo.

Figure 5.--Floodwater !lowing down Casiano Road in
Bel.Air (suburban Los Angeles) jams parked car
against fence and lamppost. Photograph cour-
tesy of World.Wide Photos.

In Ventura and Santa Barbara Counties. to
the west of Los Angcles County, peak discharges
were unprecedented and damage was
correspondingly high. In the Santa
Paula.Fillmore-Piru area, the Santa Clara River
and Santa Paula Creek spilled over their banks
and caused the evacuation of about 3,000
persons. Evacuations were also neccssary along
the Ventura River and in the Ojai Valley where
such communities as Live Oak, Oak View, and
Meiners Oaks were hard hit. Highway damage
was heavy throughout Ventura County. In Santa
Barbara County all the small streams south of
the Santa Ynez River were in extreme nood; the
severest damage occurred in the towns of
Montecito and Carpinteria. In both those towns,
streams changed their courses and cut new
channels through residential areas. On the Santa
Y nez River, the spillways of Gibraltar and
Cachuma Dams carried nows that equaled or
slightly exceeded.those for. which they had been
designed. There was no damage to the strhctures
but damage was severe in the Solvang and
Lompoc areas downstream.

I n general the nood of January ] 969 was
comparable to that of March 1938. The 1938
nood had been the most damaging nood of
recent times in southern California and its peak
discharges are usually used as a standard for

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