U C L A

Civil & Environmental Engineering Department

 

Presents

CEE 249 Seminar Series

 

 

California’s Levees:  Then and Now

by

 

Timothy M. Wehling, P.E.

California Department of Water Resources

Sacramento, CA

 

November 3, 2009

4:00 – 5:00PM

Kinsey Pavilion 1220B

 

Abstract

 

The future of California’s aging levee system depends in part on our ability to understand and appreciate its history.  The pioneering settlers of California started building the levees 160 years ago during the Gold Rush.  Farmers built levees to reclaim floodplains and safeguard crops.  Gold miners built levees to keep rivers fast and narrow, not slow and wide, so that the rivers would become self cleaning and wash the silt out to the Bay.  Today, we have a massive system of levees built with methods and materials not suitable for safeguarding vast housing developments, and river capacities not ideal for safely passing design storm events from reservoirs.  Even with the USACE engineered flood by-pass systems, climate change and the anticipated wetter storms and faster spring snowmelts worsen the problem.  That levee system is now the heart of California’s water distribution system, and in turn the blood flow of the 6th largest economy in the world.  California’s levees are deteriorating at an rapidly and require a major overhaul.  The State of California, through the Department of Water Resources and the local levee districts have begun improving the levee system, but the People’s commitment so far is only a down payment compared to the resources needed to properly fix the system.  This presentation focuses on the history of California’s levees and the current levee improvement efforts.  The ending of this story will unfold in the next decade or so.  Either the levees will undergo an expensive remediation, or the system may fail when it’s finally tested by the design event.  The goal is to better secure our State’s water infrastructure before it’s too late.

 

Biographical Sketch: Mr. Wehling is a Senior Engineer with the California Department of Water Resources. He holds an MS degree in Geotechnical Engineering from U.C. Davis.