a better bay?
Developers argued that if bay alterations had not been stopped, the Bay could have provided additional land, fresh water for millions of Californians,
an improved transport system, and a ring of military bases that could help defend the area in the event of war.
an improved transport system, and a ring of military bases that could help defend the area in the event of war.
"According to Richard Walker, a professor of geography at UC Berkeley,
this was the ethos of the day:
The bay served no purpose. To fill it up was to make it useful.
“We’d had the depression, the war. There was lot of money to be made in expanding cities, expanding highways, building bridges,”"
-Amy Standen, KQED Science Reporter
In addition to the careless pollution and filling of San Francisco Bay over the years, there have been many plans to purposefully fill and alter the Bay in order to have more land for houses, freeways, and airports. For example, the San Francisco and Oakland airports are built on bay fill. They have been vital to the growth and economy of the Bay Area and demonstrate the great economic potential of successful bay alteration.
Other plans have proposed to "improve" the Bay by building dams and extracting freshwater for California's growing population and agriculture.
One of the biggest plans was the Reber Plan, which was originally proposed in 1929 and grew in scope throughout the years, especially after World War II. It called for large dams to be built and two freshwater lakes to be created, along with aqueducts for transporting water to the San Joaquin Valley, and naval bases for protection. |
Various plans for developing
the Bay over the years |
"Dumping garbage into the bay wasn't only convenient, it served the larger goal of getting rid of the bay entirely." |
"Reber argued the bay was |
evaluating changes with the Bay Model
"I think that the Bay Model was a part of a lot different things
that happened that helped save San Francisco Bay."
-William Angeloni, Former Chief Engineer, Bay Model
Personal Interview
In order to evaluate these plans, the US Army Corps of Engineers built a giant hydraulic scale model of San Francisco Bay in 1957. Researchers began running simulations of the Reber Plan on the model. The Army Corps of Engineers research report, published in 1963, concluded that the plan was “infeasible by any frame of reference.” The plan would have been an ecological disaster and the fresh water lakes envisioned would have still been brackish. The plan would have killed thousands of animal species and would have, in essence, killed the Bay.
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"I think that the bay would have been very much destroyed, based on what was happening right after World War II, all the filling that was going on. There was lots of industry during World War II, the country was building ships in Richmond and Sausalito, all the stuff for the war effort. All that industry was still here after the war. Much of it around the waterfront was built, just like the land where the Bay Model is, the old shipyard, was all built on filled land. Things were done in a hurry. The quickest way to do it was to go ahead and fill in the land. The Bay Model showed people that it was not a good idea, and eventually we would pay the price, in terms of a bay that was not a very desirable place to be." |
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(Personal Photos of the Bay Model, 2016)
"It (Bay Model) helped a lot of people understand the Bay and understand the importance of keeping it, maintaining it.... There were facilities...around the bay, whether it was sewage treatment plant for a city or outflow from one of the big refineries, those all had to be tested in the Model and designed so that they would not damage water quality and not damage the bay environment. In that sense I think that it did a lot of good over the years, and I think it made a lot of people aware how sensitive that whole estuary is."
-William Angeloni, Former Chief Engineer, Bay Model
Personal Interview