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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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It came down pretty good for a while here in East Redlands today.
The goat-dish rain-gauge is showing almost a half-inch.
Looks like summer's our new rainy season, like I've been predicting all year.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Jul 11, 2014 - 05:11pm PT
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This is too good.
The State seeks to ban, among other things, using water to wash sidewalks.
http://www.latimes.com/science/sciencenow/la-sci-sn-water-outdoor-20140709-story.html
But up in San Francisco, washing down the sidewalk is how you "flush", because pissing and shitting on the sidewalk is a tradition as old as The City itself.
Now, San Francisco is in a quandary.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/S-F-to-water-agency-We-need-to-spray-away-our-5616104.php
San Francisco has volunteered numerous ways for other people to cut back on water, such as telling farmers which crops they should grow, or criticizing those who grow grass in their suburban yards. To be enforced by law, if they get their way.
Now, out-of-towners are giving advice to San Francisco, and like anybody else, they're not real happy about it.
We'll see if they're really serious about conservation.
If it's yellow, let it mellow. If it's brown, keep it around.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Jul 11, 2014 - 06:11pm PT
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Did you read that link ( second one ) I posted, Mr Kay?
"...the city counted 16,164 reports of streets and sidewalks in need of cleaning in the past year, the bulk of which concerned human waste"
"flusher trucks"
Last year, when the train escalators quit working, it was because they were fouled with human excrement.
http://www.sfgate.com/bayarea/article/Human-waste-shuts-down-BART-escalators-3735981.php
I don't know about the rain in the Sierras, but last summer, the San Gorgonio range caught more of the desert monsoons than usual, and got enough rain to keep all the usual backcountry water sources flowing, including the ones that dry up in dry years.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Jul 11, 2014 - 07:20pm PT
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L.A. never cleans theirs. They tried to once, but the homeless lawyered up and sued to stop the cleaning.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Jul 11, 2014 - 08:02pm PT
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"All employees must use the Hand Sanitizer after using the restroom and before returning to work."
Remember Iced Pirates? It was perhaps the defining film of the eighties.
[Click to View YouTube Video]
It's not this bad yet, Patrick.
This drought is like the movie..."Let's see where this goes, not that it's real enjoyable. But what if..."
What if everyone tried this?
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couchmaster
climber
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Jul 16, 2014 - 07:54am PT
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California is reporting that for May, despite Gov Browns call to reduce useage 20%, water use in California actually rose this year over last.
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Jul 16, 2014 - 08:02am PT
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That's because there's a drought, Couchmaster.
During rainy years, we use less water.
Of course, this surprises guys like Governor Brown.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 16, 2014 - 08:45am PT
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Californians as a whole have failed to conserve water during the worst drought in a generation, according to data reviewed by the board at its meeting Tuesday in Sacramento.
that's a terrible article-- i've read three different pieces on that meeting, and they've all been equally bad.
the Leg and Gov are just flailing. Water is too explosive, so it's en endless round of ceremonial public displays.
it's no accident than all of the Norcal-Delta region legislators have been cut out of the House-Senate water bill reconciliation talks. same thing happened with the SWP-- it's almost certainly the prelude to So SJ and MWD screwing the Delta.
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Ken M
Mountain climber
Los Angeles, Ca
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Jul 16, 2014 - 09:46am PT
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In terms of the OP, the drought is getting worse.
There are communities that are now trucking in water.
In the cities, like LA, single family dwellings account for most of the water use, and half of that is used on landscaping/outdoors.
Like most, I don't have a problem with people using water for vital functions. But I have a big problem with people wasting it.
They say that if you want to send people a message, send it on the back of a check....and that's what we are getting to, now.
You can talk about building infrastructure....tunnels, dams, desal, recycling...but those take at least a decade to make happen. It'll have NO effect on what's going on now.
The ONLY thing that will affect current usage levels is cutting the usage.
Can most cut 20%? easily. It would be MUCH harder to cut gasoline by 20%.
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Reilly
Mountain climber
The Other Monrovia- CA
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Jul 16, 2014 - 09:49am PT
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Does anybody foresee the day when the discussion begins vis a vis-à-vis unlimited growth?
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 16, 2014 - 10:13am PT
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again 75% of all water used in cali is used by agriculture.
most of that water is taxpayer-subsidized and delivered at below market rates.
most of the rest is getting pumped, unmonitored and unregulated, out of common aquifers in ways that directly damage public infrastructure that is then repaired by taxpayers.
the vast majority of taxpayers are urbanites. the vast majority of cali taxes are raised in urban areas.
the constant handwringing in this thread about toilets is a bad sideshow. we have indeed built in water-poor areas and continue to do so-- but urban areas, with obvious exceptions like sacramento, have dramatically reduced per capita water use since 1990. there are particular locales where urban conservation is important but it isn't important statewide
again, we use 75% of the water to produce 3-5% of our economy, and we use taxpayer susbsidies to do it.
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CCT
Trad climber
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Jul 16, 2014 - 11:29am PT
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Seconded about the new orchards. I was a little shocked to see one on the drive back from Yosemite this weekend.
Water rights in this state are managed oddly, to say the least.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 16, 2014 - 11:32am PT
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Seems every time I drive out to Modesto I see new almond orchards being put in. I've only just started to see people holding off -- they've prepared the land but are waiting... probably for another well to be drilled.
Clearly the only way forward is to regulate well drilling for agricultural use, at least in the central valley. Right now it's pretty much: dig deeper and whoever has the deepest well wins.
yeah, and the latest uc davis study actually didn't make that clear because they lumped in all the new almonds going in around oakdale, modesto and fresno with the fallowing in other locales, so the huge expansion of permanent crops (mostly going into what used to be pasturage) is invisible to a lot of folks. and yeah, it's new megawells driving it.
the main constraints at the moment are the backlog of well-drillers and the nursery supply of row-read almond/walnut seedlings.
we're seeing a huge rush of profit-taking as folks scramble to suck turn as much as possible of their neighbor's water into almonds and cash.
dmt is right, it's all going to go to a huge court cluster. there is zero political will on either side of the aisle to deal with what everyone competent understands to be the key issues.
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Ed Hartouni
Trad climber
Livermore, CA
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Jul 16, 2014 - 11:37am PT
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 16, 2014 - 11:42am PT
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that chart would look radically different right now
huge increase in groundwater pumping. and we can't even really quantify it, because california is the one state that doesn't have any real monitoring.
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mouse from merced
Trad climber
The finger of fate, my friends, is fickle.
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Jul 16, 2014 - 12:03pm PT
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You think it surprises Gov. Brown that people, you for example, refuse to use less water (by your own words) and in fact purposely use more?
Sting us, Milktoast.
Catholics' holy water: "$500 fine per parishioner, Monsignor."
Each trip through the car wash: "$500 fine, Lady."
Each time the baby gets thrown out with the bath water: "$500 fine and two years in jail for child endangerment, Mom."
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Chaz
Trad climber
greater Boss Angeles area
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Jul 16, 2014 - 12:04pm PT
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Up until forty years ago, California's water supply kept pace with our population growth.
Then it stopped. Guess who was Governor then?
In the meantime, our population has doubled, yet the State hasn't done a damn thing to ensure the water supply has kept up with the increase. Nothing for forty years.
Yet there are billions of dollars for Bullet Trains and *stem cell research* ( which hasn't produced a cure for anything, despite billons spent ). None of those are more necessary than water.
The same people who are responsible for water being a problem now wonder why water use goes up during a drought, and they wonder why people don't have a lot of faith in their solutions.
Nobody's surprised by this, except for guys like Governor Brown.
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klk
Trad climber
cali
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Jul 16, 2014 - 12:11pm PT
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Up until forty years ago, California's water supply kept pace with our population growth.
this isn't even remotely true-- not even in the same galaxy let alone the ballpark.
ignorance is not a good foundation for advancing empirical claims.
and no, brown's not going to offer any real political leadership on this issue nor is, apparently, any other influential california or national politician.
nor do the california voters want it.
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