San Pablo Reservoir

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San Pablo Reservoir
San Pablo Reservoir 2.jpg
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San Pablo Reservoir
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San Pablo Reservoir
Location Contra Costa County, California, United States
Coordinates 37°56′36″N122°15′42″W / 37.94333°N 122.26167°W / 37.94333; -122.26167
Type Reservoir
Primary inflows San Pablo Creek
Primary outflows San Pablo Creek
Catchment area 23.37 sq mi (60.5 km2)
Basin  countriesUnited States
Surface elevation305 ft (93 m)

The San Pablo Reservoir is an open cut terminal water storage reservoir owned and operated by the East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD). It is located in the valley of San Pablo Creek, north of Orinda, California, United States, and south of El Sobrante and Richmond, east of the Berkeley Hills between San Pablo Ridge and Sobrante Ridge.

Contents

San Pablo Dam

Aerial view of San Pablo Reservoir, with dam at the left; Briones Reservoir behind San Pablo and Briones Reservoirs aerial.jpg
Aerial view of San Pablo Reservoir, with dam at the left; Briones Reservoir behind

The earthen San Pablo Dam, built in 1919(104 years ago), is located at the El Sobrante end of the reservoir, above Kennedy Grove. The reservoir has a total capacity of 38,600 acre-feet (47,600,000 m3) and a watershed of 23.37 square miles (60.5 square kilometres). A water tunnel runs under the hills to the west from the reservoir to a pumping plant in Kensington. The San Pablo Dam Road runs along the west side of the reservoir. EBMUD's Briones Reservoir is in the hills southeast of the San Pablo Reservoir and drains into the reservoir.

Although the dam impounds the waters of San Pablo Creek, the great bulk of its water is imported via the Mokelumne Aqueduct from Pardee Reservoir located over a hundred miles to the east in the Sierra Nevada foothills.

San Pablo Reservoir Recreation Area

San Pablo Reservoir from Inspiration Point in Tilden Park San Pablo Reservoir from Inspiration Point.jpg
San Pablo Reservoir from Inspiration Point in Tilden Park

EBMUD owns and maintains the San Pablo Reservoir Recreation Area, which consists of boating and fishing access to the reservoir itself, and some watershed land on the west side of the reservoir. EBMUD charges $7 for daily entrance into the park. The recreation area is managed under contract by Urban Parks Concessionaires (UPC) and includes a restaurant (the San Pablo Grill) and gift shop, where fishing permits can be purchased and boats can be rented. There are picnic areas, a children's play area and a boat launch ramp.

Because this reservoir is a storage facility for drinking water, swimming and wading are prohibited. Fishing, boating, and canoeing are allowed. However, to reduce the possibility of gasoline components in the reservoir, only four-cycle engines using MTBE-free gasoline are allowed.

There is a 5+12 miles (8.9 km) hiking and biking trail along the west side of the reservoir. Most of this trail is on the Old San Pablo Dam Road, replaced in the 1950s by the current San Pablo Dam Road. It is not possible to legally circumnavigate the reservoir on hiking trails. While there are trails on the east side of the reservoir to accommodate a circumnavigation, they are off-limits even to people with EBMUD Trail Permits, and the roadway on top of San Pablo Dam proper is similarly restricted.

Many anglers fish on the reservoir for smallmouth bass, white sturgeon, bluegill and crappie, along with the regularly planted trout and catfish. The California Office of Environmental Health Hazard Assessment (OEHHA) has developed a safe eating advisory for fish caught in the San Pablo Reservoir based on levels of mercury or PCBs found in local species. [1]

San Pablo Reservoir was the potential venue for the rowing and canoe races in the case that San Francisco would host the 2024 Summer Olympics. This would not have been the first time the reservoir hosted a rowing regatta. Since May 2015, the Oakland Strokes have organized the USRowing Southwest Masters Regional Championships on San Pablo. [2] [3]

San Pablo Dam San Pablo Dam.jpg
San Pablo Dam

Seismic retrofit

In October 2004, a study commissioned by EBMUD concluded that a major earthquake on the Hayward Fault could cause the San Pablo Dam to settle as much as 35 feet (11 m). As a short-term measure, the district lowered the reservoir level by 20 feet (6.1 m) to create a 35-foot (11 m) buffer. [4] [5]

The dam was seismically retrofitted without going out of commission by mixing concrete into the soil at the toe of the dam. A new buttress layer has been added above that on the downstream side of the dam. [6] Construction began in August 2008 and was completed in September 2010. [7]

See also

Related Research Articles

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East Bay Municipal Utility District (EBMUD), colloquially referred to as "East Bay Mud", is a public utility district which provides water and sewage treatment services for an area of approximately 331 square miles (860 km2) in the eastern side of the San Francisco Bay. As of 2018, EBMUD provides drinking water for approximately 1.4 million people in portions of Alameda County and Contra Costa County in California, including the cities of Richmond, El Cerrito, Hercules, San Pablo, Pinole, Lafayette, Moraga, Orinda, Danville, Oakland, Piedmont, Emeryville, Berkeley, Albany, Alameda, San Leandro, neighboring unincorporated regions, and portions of cities such as Hayward and San Ramon. Sewage treatment services are provided for 685,000 people in an 88-square-mile area (as of 2018). EBMUD currently has an average annual growth rate of 0.8% and is projected to serve 1.6 million people by 2030. Headquartered in Oakland, EBMUD owns and maintains 2 water storage reservoirs on the Mokelumne River, 5 terminal reservoirs, 91 miles (146 km) of water transmission aqueducts, 4,100 miles (6,600 km) of water mains, 6 water treatment plants (WTPs), 29 miles (47 km) of wastewater interceptor sewer lines and a regional wastewater treatment facility (WWTF) rated at a maximum treatment capacity of 320 MGD.

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San Pablo Creek is an 18.7-mile-long (30.1 km) creek in Contra Costa County, California, United States, which drains the canyon or valley between the San Pablo Ridge and the Sobrante Ridge, parts of the Pacific Coast Ranges east of San Francisco Bay.

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References

  1. Admin, OEHHA (2014-12-30). "San Pablo Reservoir". OEHHA. Retrieved 2018-06-13.
  2. "USRowing Southwest Masters Regional Championships". www.usrowing.org. Archived from the original on 2011-01-06.
  3. "Sf2024 - Cập nhật tin tức Web Game Online mới nhất".
  4. San Pablo Dam Vulnerable to Earthquake Archived 2010-04-23 at the Wayback Machine , EBMUD Press Release, October 27, 2004
  5. Water Level Lowered at Reservoir, Lee, Henry K., San Francisco Chronicle, October 28, 2004
  6. Public Notice of Application to Fill Wetlands Archived 2007-07-01 at the Wayback Machine , U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, December 22, 2006
  7. "San Pablo Dam Seismic Upgrade | East Bay Municipal Utility District - EBMUD". Archived from the original on 2011-05-16. Retrieved 2011-07-26.