History
The original purpose of the project was to provide water for arid Southern California, whose local water resources were insufficient to sustain the region's growth. Construction began in the late 1950s, with major funding approved in a 1960 bond measure. The vote on the bond split along North-South lines, as Northern Californians opposed the measure as a boondoggle and an attempt to steal their water resources. Most of the water (roughly 80%) carried by the project is used for agriculture, primarily in the San Joaquin Valley, since pumping the water over the Tehachapi Mountains is costly and Southern California has other sources of water such as the Owens River, tributary creeks to Mono Lake and the Colorado River.
Read more about this topic: California State Water Project
Famous quotes containing the word history:
“We have need of history in its entirety, not to fall back into it, but to see if we can escape from it.”
—José Ortega Y Gasset (1883–1955)
“No one can understand Paris and its history who does not understand that its fierceness is the balance and justification of its frivolity. It is called a city of pleasure; but it may also very specially be called a city of pain. The crown of roses is also a crown of thorns. Its people are too prone to hurt others, but quite ready also to hurt themselves. They are martyrs for religion, they are martyrs for irreligion; they are even martyrs for immorality.”
—Gilbert Keith Chesterton (1874–1936)
“What has history to do with me? Mine is the first and only world! I want to report how I find the world. What others have told me about the world is a very small and incidental part of my experience. I have to judge the world, to measure things.”
—Ludwig Wittgenstein (1889–1951)