I can’t find which thread was recently suborned by a water crisis discussion, so here we are.
And here we go. Town will run out of water completely in a couple of months. Fire hydrants aren’t working, and people are getting fungal infections of the lungs because the soil is so dry that spores are blown around.
But the mayor recently voted against a ban on watering lawns because OTHER cities still get to water THEIR lawns, and it’s not fair! Now they have a ban, but many ignore it because hey, it’s my lawn! The mayor blames “the government we have now,” as opposed to the one that told Californians to rake their forests.
I saw this article yesterday. Apparently it’s a Republican voting town? I looked at it on Google Maps and it seems to be in the middle of the desert? It also sounds like it was built when Coal was a thing in California, and realistically this was never really a greatly inhabitable area of the state to begin with… and all the water was coming from elsewhere almost from the start?
I couldn’t feel all that bad for these people tbh. They’re living in a desert and created an oasis purely via financial means. Either pay the going price for water or it’s time to move to where the water is located?
I maintain that keeping huge green grass lawns are the dumbest thing people do on the regular, but many cities and HOAs enforce them anyway not to mention societal norms in general.
Coalinga is notorious if you ever drive I5 between Norcal and Socal. Its largest feature is a massive cattle finishing yard next to the interstate. You quickly learn to recirculate the air in your cabin as you approach the town.
I wonder if the big prison there will get water, and the JC.
Coalinga is one of many towns that fit the descriptions being given here. The town population is probably majority poor and minority.
IIRC this also isn’t the first time. If it wasn’t Coalinga I am thinking of it was another small town in the area.
Ag pumping has lowered water levels and cities as well as farmers are unable to maintain reasonable water flows. It is a valley wide problem but worse on the west side.
I thought this was interesting: Along the California railroad lines, they had to set up stations to resupply trains with coal along their routes. There were several of these stations, which were designated by letters. This was Coaling Station A, abbreviated on maps as “Coaling A”. This eventually became “Coalinga”, which for reasons unknown, is pronounced “Co-a-ling-a”, not “Coaling-Ay” like it should be.
I have no idea if this is true, but it sounds good.
That is a true story. I have been in and thru Coalinga many times. I had a friend there and my company did work there following the earthquake many years ago.
South Africa faced a similar water crisis, where they were weeks away from having no water… but they managed to turn it around by changing their behaviors.
Americans can actually do that, but we’ll almost certainly wait until our backs are against the wall before we do.
“The Americans can always be trusted to do the right thing, once all other possibilities have been exhausted.”
The local news actually had a UC professor on yesterday saying we need more dams for events like this as locally a couple dams are releasing water to avoid over filling.
Typical California with drought followed by flood.
I wish someone would have warned us about the possibility of extreme weather conditions as the globe heats up. Those climate change “scientists” are useless.
