Canyon Lake is heading into a months-long closure, and the part everyone usually sees from a boat is about to become the part everyone can walk around and stare at instead. The lake in the Tonto National Forest will close starting Tuesday for dam safety inspections and maintenance, with all boat ramps and access points closed to the public through February. State Route 88 will remain open, because even in Arizona, the road gets to keep its job.
The work is not a mystery project. Salt River Project announced the plans last year, and the dam goes through maintenance every 20 years. SRP and the Bureau of Reclamation will inspect and maintain Mormon Flat Dam, Horse Mesa Dam and the river channel downstream of Horse Mesa, which leads into Canyon Lake. To do that, crews have to lower the water level so they can reach equipment that is normally underwater. Nature, as usual, is being asked to move out of the way for infrastructure.
According to SRP, the drawdown project starts next Wednesday and is expected to last about 16 weeks. The timeline breaks down pretty neatly: about four weeks to lower the lake by about 54 feet, about eight weeks for the inspections and maintenance, and then about another four weeks to refill the lake to its normal level using water from upstream reservoirs. SRP also said no water will be wasted and the drawdown will not interfere with delivering water to customers. That is the sort of sentence that sounds reassuring because it has to.
The lower water level is already raising questions in Tortilla Flat, where business depends on people headed to Canyon Lake. John Buber, the general manager there, said the lake has been full for as long as he has been there, and seeing it at the bottom will be odd. He also said he wants people to know Tortilla Flat is open and ready for visitors. That matters, because when a lake goes quiet for maintenance, the nearby businesses do not exactly get a vacation.
The exposed lake bed may also create a different kind of draw for visitors, which is the kind of thing Arizona does best: turning a temporary inconvenience into a roadside curiosity. For now, the official story is simple. The lake is closing, the work is necessary, and the water will come back. The only thing getting drained faster than Canyon Lake is the patience of anyone who thought this would be a normal Tuesday.
— Bill Farr
