Last month witnessed the opening of supplemental gates on the Sacramento Weir.  This was the action of the California Department of Water Resources and marked the first time in 10 years that these had been opened.  The move was undertaken following the manifestation of heavy storms throughout the region.

Historically, Californians have loved water. Opening this infrastructure (which is 100 years old) was quite the spectacle.  It required someone to use a long, hooked pole to manually unlatch all of the 48 wooden floodgates.

But, as interested as Sacramentans may have been, it seems sleep won through since state workers opened the weir while it was still dark, very early in the morning.  Still, those who wanted were able to catch a glimpse of the water thundering over the weir and into the Yolo Bypass, thereafter flooding the plain and protecting Sacramento city.

Weirs can be beneficial to cities such as Sacramento. They are extremely simple devices used to measure open channel flows and are inexpensive with an easy installation process.  Further, weir boxes can be helpful in cases where flow is above ground and water flow is piped.  In the case of Sacramento, the weir used flushes excess water into the Yolo Bypass floodplain from the Sacramento River system.  This ensures Sacramento and neighboring river towns are less likely to get swamped.