The Colorado River: Mulholland turned east to the Colorado River as a new
source of water. He began a
four-year series of surveys in 1923 to find an alignment that would
bring the water of the Colorado River to Los Angeles. In 1925 the Department of Water and Power (DWP) was
established and the voters of Los Angeles approved a $2 million bond
issue to perform the engineering for the Colorado River Aqueduct.
The DWP brought the cities of the region together with Part of the success of the project was the spectacular
Boulder Canyon project, now known as Hoover Dam. The DWP, manager of its own hydroelectric power facilities
along the Los Angeles Aqueduct, was instrumental in the struggle to gain
federal approval for the project which combined flood control, water
supply, and energy production for the three states that form the lower
Colorado River basin. Los Angeles, as primary consumer of the power, guaranteed
its power purchases against the federal government’s costs for the
dam. Completed in 1935, the
dam began furnishing power to the city the following year over a
226-mile transmission line built by the DWP. Upon the completion of the Colorado River Aqueduct in 1941,
MWD began to wholesale Colorado River water to its member agencies.
Today those agencies include 14 cities, 12 municipal water
districts, and a county water authority.
More than 130 municipalities and many unincorporated areas are
served by this project of the DWP’s and Mulholland’s vision. Before his death on July 22, 1935, Mulholland lived to see the beginnings of the Colorado River Aqueduct and Hoover Dam, constructed in the spirit of greatness he had always envisioned for Los Angeles. |
Los Angeles in 1928 to form a state special district.