Woman's Voice: It takes a while to build the project.
Man's Voice: Running out of space.
Woman's Voice: There has been tradeoffs.
Man's Voice: Battles between the West Slope and the Front Range.
Man's Voice: Very vulnerable to flooding.
Man's Voice: Every economy is water-based.
Man's Voice: I think there has to be a way to keep agriculture alive in the valley.
Woman's Voice: And we have so many different things that we need to protect.
Man's Voice: But we don't have enough water.
[Music]
John F. Kennedy: The words Fryingpan-Arkansas must, of necessity, be a name which is taken on faith.
But when they come here to this State and see how vitally important it is, not just to this State
but to the West, to the United States, then they realize how important it is
that all the people of the country support this project which belongs to all the people of the country.
Narrator: The water was here in 1902 when the Bureau of Reclamation was established.
It was here in 1932 when the Lower Arkansas Valley began searching for a solution to the unreliable water supply.
President Kennedy signed that solution into law in 1962 and the Fryingpan-Arkansas Project is with us today,
carrying us through 50 years of golden benefits.
Secretary Salazar: As a Coloradoan and as your Attorney General, US Senator, now as a Cabinet Secretary,
I've had the honor to work with the Fry-Ark Project on a number of issues over many years.
It was a major infrastructure investment project and a national commitment to create economic vitality
and jobs in an otherwise arid region of the West.
The history of Colorado's Arkansas River basin is long.
Native Americans, Texas, France, Mexico, they've all claimed it in the past.
Flooding often in the spring and early summer and going nearly dry in mid-summer and early fall,
the river has defined both itself and the region it inhabits.
Bob Rawlings: It wasn't the dust bowl, it was the dirt bowl. I can still remember those dust storms coming in.
I was in school then. I remember one of them in particular.
There was a cloud of tannish brown dirt coming toward us. It was probably 20 miles away.
It went from horizon to horizon and was moving toward us.
That's why in 1936, people across the basin asked the Bureau of Reclamation
to study the possibility of a trans-mountain diversion project.
Jim Broderick: They weren't sure what that was,
but they knew that all the water was on the West Slope and they wanted to get some of it.
Howard "Bub" Miller: Vegetable producers have to have a stable water supply.
So they look at the supply of water that's going to be available and they in turn will decide what kind of crops they're going to raise.
Reclamation conducted investigations for more than 20 years,
researching the logistical possibilities and related challenges.
[Music]
Bob Rawlings: Well, there was a representative on the water committee in the Congress from the Western Slope.
Jane Rawlings: Oh, yes.
Bob Rawlings: Yes. He had a little different viewpoint about taking water from the Western Slope.
Dave Merritt: When you diverted water out of the basin of origin, out of the basin of the Colorado River system, then it had impacts.
The solution came in the form of a new reservoir, Ruedi Reservoir, near Basalt, Colorado.
Dave Merritt: Ruedi Reservoir, on the Fryingpan River, provides replacement storage,
provides storage for use in Western Colorado as our needs grow.
Once the West Slope question was settled, the Fryingpan-Arkansas bill moved forward in Congress.
Jim Broderick: The early attempt was selling frying pans to be able to raise money to go to Washington to lobby.
Bob Rawlings: I can remember as a kid, everybody from Leadville, Salida, Canon City, Pueblo,
Manzanola, Rocky Ford, Swink, all the towns, everybody had little frying pans.
Jane Rawlings: I remember.
[Music]
Construction on the Fry-Ark project began with Ruedi Dam, in 1964 and concluded in 1968.
What isn't stored in Ruedi Reservoir is collected upstream from the high reaches of the Fryingpan River valley.
Tom Musgrove: Above Ruedi Reservoir, there are 16 diversion sites which collect water and funnel it to Boustead Tunnel,
which is a five mile long tunnel under the Continental Divide. That water winds up in Turquoise Reservoir.
From there, it's moved through the Mt. Elbert Conduit. It will generate electricity at the Mt. Elbert Powerplant at Twin Lakes.
From Twin Lakes, the water's released and travels 143 miles downstream to Pueblo Dam, where it's held in storage
until it's called for by agriculture or municipal interests.
Work to enlarge Twin Lakes began in 1975. By then, Mt. Elbert Powerplant, the largest hydroelectric powerplant in Colorado,
was under construction on the lake's northern shore.
Daniel Payton: In general, it's the first pump storage project, I believe, that was built by the Bureau of Reclamation.
As a reversible pump back unit, the Mt. Elbert Powerplant is a standout in renewable energy.
Generating electricity during the day, the units spin backwards at night,
pumping the same water up so it can be dropped again to generate more hydropower.
[Music]
Today, the Fry-Ark Project provides water to nine Colorado counties and serves over 200,000 irrigated acres.
Howard "Bub" Miller: In the valley south, especially southeast Colorado, if we didn't have the project,
we would not have the crops that we raise today.
Kevin Karney: The Fry-Ark Project helps on the shoulder seasons in two ways, and the shoulder seasons are the spring and fall.
In the spring of the year, the winter water storage program really helps, where water is stored from November 15th to March 15th.
Howard "Bub" Miller: It's cold in Arkansas Valley in the winter, and we used to, before we had the project, we had to irrigate.
Fight the ice jams in the canal system, and you were putting water on ground that didn't have a living crop on it.
Bill Long: In Bent County, we get our Fry-Ark water in two different ways.
The agriculture entities get it delivered through the Arkansas River.
The irrigators take their water at their diversion points for use on their crops such as corn, alfalfa,
cantaloupe, onions, a whole variety of crops, predominantly corn and alfalfa.
The project also provides water to 650,000 people.
Alan Hamel: It's a vital resource to us as a municipality, because we get the right to carry our water over.
So in those wetter years, we can store or save. It's like an insurance policy.
Gary Bostrom: If the Fry-Ark Project was not built, or not here, Colorado Springs Utilities,
other entities within Fountain Valley Authority would have to look for other supplies of water.
Most likely within the Arkansas that would be some form of agricultural water that we would acquire and convey to Colorado Springs.
Bill Long: The municipalities downstream of Pueblo take their water primarily through an augmentation plant.
We are unable to take delivery of Fry-Ark water through a pipeline, as we do not have that ability yet.
The Mt. Elbert Powerplant generates enough power to provide 35,000 American homes with electricity for a year.
Daniel Payton: What we're seeing is a constantly changing dynamic and that is,
whereas Fry-Ark was envisioned to meet certain amounts of load during the day and for pumping back at night.
What we're seeing now is some real value in its moment to moment capability of what we call regulating
on a second by second basis, system constantly stays in balance.
And that's the real value we've seen over the last 10, 15 years is that Mt. Elbert has this unique capability
of being able to follow this load on a very close basis and keep things in balance. So, it's become a very valuable unit.
Like many Reclamation projects across the West, the Fry-Ark serves multiple purposes,
such as recreation and fish and wildlife conservation. These were also considered in the project's authorization.
Brad Henley: One of the greatest benefits of the Fry-Ark Project is the economic value of the recreation.
Greg Felt: The Arkansas River is the most popular white-water rafting river in the world.
Last year, in a Division of Wildlife national survey, it was ranked the number one moving water fishery in Colorado.
That wouldn't have happened without the Fry-Ark Project and the collaboration and
communication we've developed over the years.
Brad Henley: Hosting a little over 1.8 million visitors annually, Lake Pueblo State Park, with Pueblo Reservoir as its centerpiece
has become one of the premier destination locations for outdoor recreation in southern Colorado.
Tim O'Keefe: Obviously, the Bureau's one of the key players in how the Fryingpan's managed,
which contributes to the larger watershed and how the Roaring Fork looks in terms of flows and just seasonal changes on the river.
Sharon Clarke: It's the longest gold medal fishery in the state, there's 42 miles. And that's because of the Fry-Ark Project.
Debbie Felker: What I think is really important for people to know about the upper Colorado River Endangered Fish Recovery Program,
is that it was formed in 1988. It's a cooperative partnership and it's working to recover four species of endangered Colorado River fish.
Those are the Bonytail, Humpback Chub, Razorback Sucker and Colorado Pike Minnow.
Angela Kantola: And so, this recovery program provides the Endangered Species Act requirements for all these water projects.
Jana Mohrman: That's right, Angela. Ruedi Reservoir was very important
as it was the first pool for the fish water in this reach of the upper Colorado River.
[Music]
Water is the theme that flows through our history through these past 50 years of the Fry-Ark Project.
Jane Rawlings: The Fry-Ark Project brought us that supplemental water to the agricultural areas
and it's so important that we protect that. So important that we don't let that get away.
Tim O'Keefe: And so, I think there's just going to be a lot more collaborative efforts looking at the river.
Not just as buckets and pipes, but as how are we managing the river for the environment and recreation as well.
Daniel Payton: Fry-Ark stands ready there to be able to respond in many different ways
that we hadn't even really thought of when the plant was built.
So it's changing, it's evolving and I think it will continue to evolve.
Jim Broderick: But, what is in our control is making the best utilization of the project that we have right now.
And to look into the future to see how we can better move water and make better decisions with regards to the facilities we have.
Alan Hamel: It's all those components that make this Fry-Ark Project so special
and the dream that so many people had clear back into the 1930s, when they started dreaming.
So we need to dream today and look out to the future and start working on more
innovative approaches to make this great project even better.
Bill Long: I just hope that my generation and the generations after me will be as thoughtful
and have the same foresight as those individuals.
But we need to pass along that thanks in other ways and that is planning for our children and grandchildren's future.
Without water, our future is uncertain.
[Music]
What we do with the water,
how we use it,
how we conserve it,
defines us,
as it has for generations.
John F. Kennedy: I hope that those of us who hold positions of public responsibility in 1962
are as farseeing about the needs of this country in 1982 and 1992
as those men and women were 30 years ago who began to make this project possible.
[Music]