They do know their flood protection and 1,000 year levees...getoutahere!
An excerpt.
Dam strait
Written by Phil Hayworth/Tracy Press
Flood control officials consider a plan that would build huge gates between San Pablo and Suisun bays to prevent saltwater from invading the Delta.
STOCKTON — It’s like something out of a “Godzilla” movie: Disaster strikes Northern California and, within minutes, huge gates between San Pablo Bay and Suisun Bay slam shut, keeping salty water from pouring into the Delta and saving California’s water supply.
A giant gate at the Carquinez Strait might sound like fiction, but it’s a possibility to leaders of one county irrigation board.
“A pair of gates such as the gates constructed in Holland on the Nieuwe Waterweg,” wrote Banta-Carbona Irrigation District General Manager David Weisenberger, “should be built on the western edge of the Delta.”
Weisenberger, along with district board President Jim McLeod, floated the idea of water gates before a group of San Joaquin County flood control representatives at a meeting of the 19-member San Joaquin County Flood Control and Water Conservation District Advisory Water Commission in Stockton on Wednesday.
McLeod argued the gates would be similar to 1,000-foot water barriers already working in Holland that open and close to protect low-lying land from flooding. Applied in California, the gates would defend the San Joaquin Delta from saltwater intrusion. Such an intrusion could seriously disrupt water movement through the Delta to Tracy’s federal and state pumps in the case of a major levee break, McLeod said.
“It would destroy California,” he said. “Consider the impact of salt on agriculture; and the Delta now supplies water to 22 million Californians.”
The commission decided to send a letter to the San Joaquin County Board of Supervisors to consider such gates and draft a resolution in support of a formal study.
“And who do you suggest does the study” asked Dante Nomellini, a reclamation board chief and Stockton-based attorney.
“Well, let’s not reinvent the wheel,” replied McLeod. “Let’s give it to the Dutch.”
Citing a recent national magazine article about how the Dutch build 1,000-year levees — in contrast to California’s 100-year levees — McLeod suggested spending lots of money now to save lots of money and lives later should disaster strike area levees.
“It’s cheaper to go Dutch,” McLeod said.
