Quote:
Originally Posted by Ritarancher
The river has little chance of ever flowing again, flowing naturally. Cementing it like in Los Angeles would make Tucson ghetto and ruin te natural benefits of the wash. The river and it's banks are all sand, the support beams for themes bridge had to be placed deep underground because of all the sand. A lake in the Santa Cruz would have to be small because it's at an angle, loosing elevation northwards. Knowing that and knowing that the river is about 30 feet deep from its banks a regular cement dam in the downtown section would make a lake that would extend no father then the interstate 10 and 19 crossing, is what I'm guessing. What a better idea is to do what we did to create lakeside park on the east side. We place a dam on a tributary of the pantano and the excess water flows over the dam and the rest is kept untill the next rainstorm. Keep in mind that the Santa Cruze is where all these smaller washes, the rillato, and the pantano all lead to. As a city grows more water becomes runoff. A problem with placing skyscrapers on the banks is a bad idea, their weight will put more pressure on sand. I have also lived in Tucson for many years and I have witnessed the banks of the river collapsing into the river multiple times in various locations. I also saw the damage of the 83 floods. Plus where are we supposed to place those high rises along some of the most heavily developed land in the city. The reason that they are considering to build that sport park is because there is a lot of land for developers to plan space for excess water flow. Remember that the Santa Cruz is a very important river for our area, You wouldn't dam the Mississippi downstream from St Louis, would you?
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No, I wouldn't dam the Mississippi River downstream of St. Louis, which they haven't, but they have dammed it south of Minneapolis/St. Paul (the Twin Cities), which is the biggest metro area on the river (#2 is St. Louis with about 1/2 million less than the Twin Cities, #3 is Memphis & #4 is New Orleans).
I would actually like to see some water back in the Santa Cruz. I grew up about 15 miles from the Mississippi River (as the crow flies - took about 30 - 45 minutes to drive to it) and went swimming in it a few times when I was a kid.
This is from
Wikipedia's article on the Santa Cruz River:
"The Santa Cruz River is usually a dry riverbed through much of the year, unless the area receives significant rainfall. This was not always the case, as it was a combination of human errors and natural catastrophes in the late nineteenth century that led to the decline of the Santa Cruz
The city of Nogales, Sonora has been releasing treated sewage into the Santa Cruz River. This has resulted in the revival of several miles of riverbank within and north of the city of Nogales, Arizona."
This is a link about the decline of the river (a link to it is provided on the Wikipedia page too):
http://faculty.fordham.edu/nballantyne/santacruz.html
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You realize its nothing but sand down there right?
ugly vegetation littered the bottom which makes not a fun place to walk , jog, bike, have a party or even get drunk. Yeah, I know there's bike trails besides those dry river beds. Getting rid of those ugly vegetation by just bulldozing an area of the S.C. river bed will make a great place to dirt bike, play volleyball, play soccer or just take a stroll with your little kids and grandparents. I don't think it would cost that much to create a dirt road at a small section of the S.C. river. 
I'm against that. Equally against building 'high rises' at the banks ... proposing more like 3-5 floor buildings. 'High rises' along the banks of the river ... that would look ugly! Think of Reid Park or Armory Park stretched out at those 99.9 percent dry riverbeds.
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