Visited on 6/25/2018 after administering an examination to a Wastewater Treatment Plant operator near Fallbrook, California. I ventured 45 miles northeast of San Diego to Sutherland Reservoir. When full, the reservoir has 557 surface acres and is located at 2,074 feet above sea level with a maximum water depth of 145 feet, and 5.25 shoreline miles. The area has oak and chaparral around the shoreline. Water levels are monitored weekly. Construction on Sutherland Dam began in 1927, but it was not completed until 1954.
Lake Sutherland is owned by the City of San Diego, and the Ramona Municipal Water District also has access to the water, therefore dogs must be kept on a leash at all times and at least 50 feet away from the water. Dogs are not allowed on any boats. There is no camping allowed at Sutherland.
A civil engineer named Post surveyed the site near John Sutherland’s property in the early 1920s. As a show of gratitude for Sutherland’s kindness during Post’s survey, Post titled his submission: “Survey of Sutherland Dam Site.” Mr. Sutherland was well-known in the area as a Ramona pioneer, real estate developer and rancher.
Construction began on the dam over Santa Ysabel Creek in 1927, but was halted in 1928 for decades after a battle over water rights erupted between Escondido and San Diego. Construction resumed in 1952 after funding was secured and all water disputes were resolved. With one-quarter of the dam already complete and most of the wooden supports still in place, the dam was finished by the Daley Corporation of San Diego and Bent Construction Company of Alhambra in little more than a year and dedicated on
June 5, 1954 to a crowd of more than 300 citizens and dignitaries.
The dam is impressive,
especially when there is very little water behind it, because one can clearly observe
the engineering required in its construction. Seventeen curved semi-ecological
arches between eighteen buttresses soar 161 feet over the creek bed to a width
of 1,240 feet; concrete ten feet thick at the base tapers to only forty inches
at the top… just wide enough for a walkway across the top of the dam. The
spillway keeps water levels below 145 feet, a level that has not been reached
since the 1990s. Sutherland Dam is said to be one of the most earthquake-proof
dams in Southern California. That’s reassuring, considering that a 100-year-old
historic bridge crosses Santa Ysabel Creek less than two miles from the dam in
the direct inundation zone.
Portions of the lake’s eastern shoreline were added to the San Dieguito River Park in 2005 and trails are planned that will contain a segment of the still-being-constructed Coast-to-Crest Trail across San Diego County’s backcountry to the ocean. The trail will cross what remains of a 1896 homestead, which was a stop on the Julian-to-Ramona stagecoach route, and the San Dieguito River Valley Conservancy is still removing remnants of the farming operations. Herds of cattle and donkeys still periodically graze at the shoreline. Extensive damage was done to the landscape in the 2007 Witch Creek Fire, but Nature is staging an impressive comeback.
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