LAKE ROOSEVELT The Grand Coulee Dam and the Columbia Basin Reclamation Project

PURPOSES OF THE PROJECT

A dream of 50 years, the irrigating of a vast tract of rich desert and dry-farming load in central Washington, is about to be realized through the construction of the Grand Coulee Dam, and a system at canals that, in time, will cover an area 60 miles wide, east and west, and 85 miles long, north and south, and bring to it the life-giving waters of the Columbia River.

When fully developed, the Columbia Basin Reclamation Project will reclaim aver 1,200,000 acres of land, regulate the flow of the Columbia River far the benefit of downstream power plants and navigation, and develop electric energy to be used in pumping for irrigation and far other purposes, on the project and elsewhere.

SCOPE OF THE WORK

The enterprise involves building, in an isolated, sparsely populated district, a dam of unprecedented size, a power plant which will be, when completed, the biggest thing of its kind in the world, and a pumping plant big enough to pump dry, at least in their low-water seasons, any but a few of the largest rivers in the country. In the Grand Coulee, abandoned channel of the Columbia River, farmed during the last Ice Age, a balancing reservoir 27 miles long will be formed; and on the project lands, hundreds of miles of main and lateral canals and numerous auxiliary power and pumping plants must be built as the project develops.

LOCATIONS

The Grand Coulee Dam, principal and outstanding engineering feature of the project, is located on the Columbia River just below the head of the Grand Coulee, where for a short distance the river flows north. It is 94 miles north and west of Spokane, and 259 miles by highway east of Seattle. It is 151 miles downstream from the Canadian border, and about 600 miles above the mouth of the Columbia at Astoria.

Although it is not at the narrowest point in the river's canyon, the site for the dam was chosen because, here, close to the head of the Grand Coulee, a granite barrier once lay across the river's course and extended from the Okanogan highlands far into the basalt plateau which farms the left bank of the river above and below the dam site. The remains of this granite barrier form exceptionally good foundation and abutments for the dam.

Grand Coulee Dam is accessible by motorcar or bus, over excellent hard-surfaced roads connecting with U. S. Highway No. 10 at Wilbur, Almira, and Coulee City. An excellent hard-surfaced road, passing spectacular Dry Falls, Park Lake, Blue Lake, Lake Lenore, and Soap Lake, traverses the lower Grand Coulee between Coulee City and the town of Soap Lake, and connects with State Highway No. 7, leading to points west of the Cascades by way of Snoqualmie Pass, Chinook Pass, and Mt. Rainier, and the Columbia River highways.

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FACILITIES FOR VISITORS

Sightseers appear at the Grand Coulee Dam in such great numbers that, as a matter of safety as well as of convenience to them, special facilities for handling visitors have been provided. Only employees on shift are admitted to construction areas, but the topography at the dam serves the tourist's purposes admirably.

On each side of the river, extensive free parking areas accommodate large numbers of cars, and from positions high above and overlooking operations the visitor looks down upon the river and construction activities. Ample provisions are made for the safety and comfort of visitors.

Each week during the tourist season, thousands of visitors view with interest an accurate model of the dam located in the west vista house. There ts shown, first, one six-hundredth actual size, the vicinity as it appeared before construction work was started, then the excavated area and several stages in the progress of the work, and, finally, the model of the dam, power-houses, and pumping plant as they will finally appear.

Signs along the highway entering Government property direct the visitor to the free Government parking spaces and vista houses.