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  #21  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 9:01 PM
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I feel like all of the good spots have been taken on the US West Coast.

I guess, I am a little surprised that LA ended up being the largest city, but, once they figured out how to pipe in water from elsewhere, I guess it was a matter of time before it got 10+ million people.
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  #22  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 9:20 PM
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Originally Posted by SFBruin View Post
I feel like all of the good spots have been taken on the US West Coast.

I guess, I am a little surprised that LA ended up being the largest city, but, once they figured out how to pipe in water from elsewhere, I guess it was a matter of time before it got 10+ million people.
I think a lot of people were, lol. Anyone who lived before 1920 probably couldn't conceive of L.A. being the unequivocal largest city on the west coast.
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  #23  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 9:26 PM
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It's a massive basin next to the ocean. It's the only place like it along the entire West Coast. Easy to build and build and build. Every other spot has challenging topographical limitations.
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  #24  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 9:51 PM
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It's a massive basin next to the ocean. It's the only place like it along the entire West Coast. Easy to build and build and build. Every other spot has challenging topographical limitations.
very true.. i think the only remotely comparable location on the west coast is the flat-ish triangular region that stretches from Vancouver BC about 50 miles down to Bellingham WA and nearly 70 miles east to Harrison lake.. but unlike the LA basin, it is carved up by two rivers and a delta in the north, and then bisected by an iternational border about halfway down
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You guys are laughing now but Jacksonville will soon assume its rightful place as the largest and most important city on Earth.

I heard the UN is moving its HQ there. The eiffel tower is moving there soon as well. Elon Musk even decided he didnt want to go to mars anymore after visiting.
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  #25  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 10:30 PM
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if there was a big city in southern oregon that would be cool. if a state is primitive then its not going to get big cities, otherwise oregon would have double the population.
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  #26  
Old Posted Sep 8, 2021, 10:57 PM
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I have wondered how Utah would have developed had the Mormons never arrived. I wouldn't think Salt Lake would have been the largest city. Perhaps there would have been a larger city in the are that is now Ogden, maybe the Provo or St George areas?

I think the state would have been much less developed. Maybe more like Wyoming or Northern Nevada.
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  #27  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 2:09 AM
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I have wondered how Utah would have developed had the Mormons never arrived. I wouldn't think Salt Lake would have been the largest city. Perhaps there would have been a larger city in the are that is now Ogden, maybe the Provo or St George areas?

I think the state would have been much less developed. Maybe more like Wyoming or Northern Nevada.
it might not be a state at all. The mormons first settled around what is now salt lake city back when that region was still part of mexico. They wanted the US to take over their area of mexico and accept them into the union as a massive new state called "Deseret", which wouldve stretched from San Diego and LA all the way northeast to the tetons in wyoming, west to roughly leadville, CO, and from oregon to new mexico. congress repeatedly denied their applications until the proposed state shrank down in size to what is now utah.

my guess is without the mormons, what is now utah would be split. It is really a strange state, because it covers parts of two vastly different regions, the great basin in the west, a flat, bone-dry former lakebed puckered with tiny isolated mountain ranges, and in the east, the colorado pleateau, a maze of canyons, rivers, and ephemeral streams.

I agree it would also be much less developed. Northern utah would probably look a lot like southern idaho, with a few cities the size of twin falls and maybe one the size of boise.. spokane at most
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You guys are laughing now but Jacksonville will soon assume its rightful place as the largest and most important city on Earth.

I heard the UN is moving its HQ there. The eiffel tower is moving there soon as well. Elon Musk even decided he didnt want to go to mars anymore after visiting.
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  #28  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 7:42 AM
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It's a massive basin next to the ocean.
...with almost no natural resources.

I bet most visitors in the 1800s probably thought, "nice vacation spot", until William Mulholland realized that natural resources could move, and helped make it into the mega-region that it is today.
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  #29  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 11:21 AM
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Originally Posted by SFBruin View Post
I feel like all of the good spots have been taken on the US West Coast.

I guess, I am a little surprised that LA ended up being the largest city, but, once they figured out how to pipe in water from elsewhere, I guess it was a matter of time before it got 10+ million people.
San Francisco is no different. They pipe in their water from Yosemite National Park! Hetch Hetchy reservoir that flooded the Hetch Hetchy Valley that John Muir loved.
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  #30  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 12:29 PM
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Thunder Bay would make a good big city. Big port, rugged Lake Superior coastline, a couple of big islands in the river delta right off the current downtown. It would better connect Eastern and Western Canada too.
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  #31  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 12:42 PM
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Originally Posted by jbermingham123 View Post
It is really a strange state, because it covers parts of two vastly different regions, the great basin in the west, a flat, bone-dry former lakebed puckered with tiny isolated mountain ranges, and in the east, the colorado pleateau, a maze of canyons, rivers, and ephemeral streams.

I agree it would also be much less developed. Northern utah would probably look a lot like southern idaho, with a few cities the size of twin falls and maybe one the size of boise.. spokane at most
That's the story of nearly every Western state.

Arizona has Yuma and Flagstaff. Peaks over 12,000 feet. Sparsely vegetated desert in the extreme southwest, dense forests in the White Mountains to rangeland/grasslands. The Grand Canyon in the north, to flat valleys in southern AZ rimmed with rugged mountains. The Colorado Plateau, to sand dunes. Monument Valley to Colorado River cities. Navajo/Hopi lands to Metro Phoenix.

I agree, it is an interesting "what if" scenario to think about with Utah though. What if California didn't have any gold?
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  #32  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 1:32 PM
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With global warming, the Arctic Ocean ("Northwest Passage") will be a viable site for an export/import port city. Railroads and highways will come in from the south, to bring in grains, forest products and other goods from southern Canada and the U.S., for export to Asia and Europe, and Asian/European products will come in.
I sometimes imagine a large city on one of the rivers near the bottom of James Bay.
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  #33  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 4:15 PM
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I sometimes imagine a large city on one of the rivers near the bottom of James Bay.


Maybe on the Ontario/Quebec border
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  #34  
Old Posted Sep 9, 2021, 7:54 PM
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San Francisco is no different. They pipe in their water from Yosemite National Park!
Doesn't San Francisco at least have the option of getting water from the Sacramento River delta?

If not, then that's super interesting that neither of the major California cities have a nearby, viable water source.
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  #35  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 1:39 AM
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Doesn't San Francisco at least have the option of getting water from the Sacramento River delta?

If not, then that's super interesting that neither of the major California cities have a nearby, viable water source.
Isn't it brackish for quite a while?
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  #36  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 2:52 AM
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I have no idea. I assumed that it was drinkable, but maybe not...
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  #37  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 3:07 AM
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its brackish at least as far inland as stockton, but salt is not the problem with that water.. the problem is the high levels of dissolved fertilizer and pesticide from central valley agriculture. Those chemicals are fairly small molecules, so the only way to filter them out is through reverse osmosis, and if youre going to spend the money on that, then you might as well just use seawater. At present, reverse osmosis is so expensive that its cheaper to build dams in the sierra nevada, pipe the water over 100 miles west, pump it over another mountain chain into the bay area, and then under 5 miles of water into sf
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You guys are laughing now but Jacksonville will soon assume its rightful place as the largest and most important city on Earth.

I heard the UN is moving its HQ there. The eiffel tower is moving there soon as well. Elon Musk even decided he didnt want to go to mars anymore after visiting.
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  #38  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 3:45 AM
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Originally Posted by jbermingham123 View Post
its brackish at least as far inland as stockton, but salt is not the problem with that water.. the problem is the high levels of dissolved fertilizer and pesticide from central valley agriculture. Those chemicals are fairly small molecules, so the only way to filter them out is through reverse osmosis, and if youre going to spend the money on that, then you might as well just use seawater. At present, reverse osmosis is so expensive that its cheaper to build dams in the sierra nevada, pipe the water over 100 miles west, pump it over another mountain chain into the bay area, and then under 5 miles of water into sf
The pure Sierra water from Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite is better tasting than the delta water. SF water is one of the best in the country. So is water in NYC. Mostly fresh Catskill water from rainfall/snowfall. The water in L.A. from the eastern Sierra is also pretty good.

Last edited by CaliNative; Sep 10, 2021 at 4:34 AM.
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  #39  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 3:49 AM
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Doesn't San Francisco at least have the option of getting water from the Sacramento River delta?

If not, then that's super interesting that neither of the major California cities have a nearby, viable water source.
I think most of the water supply in SF and the Peninsula still comes via aqueduct from Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite. Some of the Hetch Hetchy water is stored in Crystal Springs and San Antonio reservoirs on the penninsula, I recall. Maybe some local sources also. Not sure where the east bay gets the water from. Maybe the state water project and local sources like ground water? There are a few big reservoirs in the east bay hills, so local rainfall must be part of it. The bay area, especially in the Santa Cruz Mountains, gets considerably more rainfall than most of the the L.A. area (except the San Gabriel Mountains, where up to 40 inches falls) so local sources must be involved as well in the water supply). L.A. city gets most of its water from the eastern Sierra, via the aqueduct, and some from local groundwater, local reservoirs, the state water project, and the Colorado River aqueduct. San Diego area gets much of the water from the state water project, local sources like runoff into reservoirs from the mountains, the Colorado aqueduct, and even a big desal plant in Carlsbad. The Diamond Valley reservoir near Hemet is a huge storage basin for water from the state water project, and provides many cities in SoCal with a backup source of water in drought years, or a one year supply if an earthquake temporarily cutoff the state water project water flow.
-----

A sampling of avg. annual precip. in Bay Area and L.A. area:

S.F. 23"; Berkeley 25"; San Jose 15"; Palo Alto 21"; Santa Cruz 32"; San Rafael 34"; Livermore 15"; Big Basin 50-60"; Muir Woods-Mt. Tam. 45-50".

L.A. 15"; Glendale 22"; Burbank 19"; Hollywood 17"; Long Beach 12"; Westwood 18"; Pasadena 19"; Sierra Madre 23"; Anaheim 13"; Mt. Wilson 32"; Topanga/Santa Monica Mountains crest 22-25"; Crystal Lake (wettest part of San Gabriels) 40-42".

Last edited by CaliNative; Sep 10, 2021 at 6:11 AM.
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  #40  
Old Posted Sep 10, 2021, 6:25 AM
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The pure Sierra water from Hetch Hetchy reservoir in Yosemite is better tasting than the delta water. SF water is one of the best in the country. So is water in NYC. Mostly fresh Catskill water from rainfall/snowfall. The water in L.A. from the eastern Sierra is also pretty good.
The most incredible thing about NYC's water system is that it is entirely gravity powered (well, technically, its solar powered... gravity isnt a source of energy), just like the old school roman aqueducts. Power outage? No problem. And then as if that wasn't cool enough, by the time the water reaches the city limits, the pressure from the elevation drop is enough to push water up 6 to 10 stories, and sometimes a bit higher, depending on how close the building is to sea level.

The second most incredible thing is that the total land area that drains into NYC's reservoirs is smaller than the drainage basin of just the hetch hetchy reservoir... and it serves 15 million people. The hetch hetchy system serves a third of that at most. The volume of fresh water freely available in the US northeast is just staggering.
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You guys are laughing now but Jacksonville will soon assume its rightful place as the largest and most important city on Earth.

I heard the UN is moving its HQ there. The eiffel tower is moving there soon as well. Elon Musk even decided he didnt want to go to mars anymore after visiting.
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