Up Above: The Geography of Suburban Sprawl in Southern California’s Antelope Valley

Matt Jalbert

The Ecology of Sprawl

I HAVE ALREADY NOTED MANY WAYS IN WHICH the Antelope Valley’s suburban development had negative environmental impact; several others bear mentioning. Perhaps the most obvious is the reliance on automobiles. Pursuit of the single-family home has pushed thousands of people into automobiles for hours each day, with all of the aforementioned social consequences. The environmental impacts are likewise alarming. Automobile travel in and out of the Antelope Valley, as well as across its expanse, has created a considerable degree of air pollution in the formerly pristine high desert air basin. Both ozone and particulate pollution are noted in the cities’ general plans as a problem requiring mitigation. As one resident sage, speaking about the reliance on long-distance commuting, told me, “You can’t have people forever sucking gasoline driving up and down a mountain.” [Footnote #52] Indeed, the Antelope Valley’s dislocated job base is critically reliant on cheap gasoline. It wouldn’t be unreasonable to expect convulsions again in the Antelope Valley’s economy should the price of gasoline ever come to reflect its many externalized costs.

The 1994 Northridge earthquake jolted many commuters in the Antelope Valley into reexamining their work situation. In that temblor, the crucial Interstate 5–Interstate 14 interchange collapsed and in a furious instant the concrete umbilical to Los Angeles was severed. Commutes that took well over an hour each way suddenly doubled or tripled as drivers were forced to take winding mountain roads or make wide diversions to distant freeways such as Interstate 15 to the east. After the quake, the Metropolitan Transit Authority (the Los Angeles regional transit agency) quickly established commuter rail service to Lancaster, using Southern Pacific Railroad’s tracks. The commuter rail line, an extension of the relatively new Metrolink, previously reached only as far north as Acton (some ten miles into Soledad Pass from Palmdale).

Since the freeway interchange was rebuilt, most commuters have returned to their autos. Palmdale planners point out, however, that the freeway breakage has resulted in an increase in work-at-home situations. Telecommuting was the first response to the earthquake damage for those whose work permitted it. Others have changed employment modes altogether and are establishing service businesses based in their homes. The last year and a half has seen an increase in these so-called “home occupation” businesses, typically established by workers unwilling to commute but unable to find sufficient local employment. [Footnote #53]

Though air pollution reductions could be achieved by more home workers, an effort by local government could negate all that. In recent weeks (March 1995), the cities of the Antelope Valley and their Los Angeles County supervisor have been trying to have the Antelope Valley removed from the South Coast Air Quality Management District (scaqmd). Arguing that the District’s ultra-stringent emissions regulations have hampered the ability of the Antelope Valley to attract industry, the local governments are trying to have the Valley redesignated to the Mojave air basin, whose regulations are much more lax. In a move typical of a region in desperate competition for income, the Antelope Valley is prepared to make a Faustian bargain, trading air quality for jobs. “We just don’t have those air pollution problems up here,” says County Deputy Supervisor Sherry Lasagna. “What with all the wind, it just blows out to the east,” [Footnote #54] she explains, apparently forgetful of the downwind communities soon to be blessed with the Antelope Valley’s effluvia.

At the same time that the Antelope Valley’s air quality is coming under assault, so too is its groundwater. For years, the Antelope Valley’s considerable aquifers have been over-tapped by agricultural and domestic users. This has resulted in a water table that drops several feet each year, or some 200 feet since it was first tapped. [Footnote #55] The Los Angeles County Waterworks, the main water supplier in the Valley, is currently engaged in the most comprehensive study yet of the Antelope Valley’s groundwater reserves, which should result in an understanding of the safe yield of the aquifers. Clearly, though, the safe yield has long been exceeded; I will discuss the problems associated with groundwater overdraft in a later section.

Attempts to control groundwater withdrawal are hampered by several factors. Anyone can drill a well and pump out water—indeed, the Los Angeles County Waterworks, Palmdale Water District, and Quartz Hill Water District are only the three largest suppliers in the Antelope Valley; dozens of other small districts and hundreds of individual wells dot the Valley. Depending on the depth of the aquifer tapped, groundwater pumping can cost approximately $85 an acre/foot. With State Water Project water costing $175 an acre/foot, [Footnote #56] there is considerable financial incentive to use groundwater rather than aqueduct water.

For most residential uses, though, water is just something that comes through the tap. The three largest water purveyors are the agencies deciding whether to tap the California Aqueduct or groundwater to meet demand. This decision is based on cost and availability. During the recent drought years, water users overdrafted groundwater just as the Valley’s State Water Project deliveries were reduced. In 1994, a year considerably wetter than preceding years, SWP water accounted for 58% of total water production in the entire North Los Angeles County area. [Footnote #57]

Water will continue to be a critical factor in the Antelope Valley’s future. The current study is an attempt to quantify just what degree of development available water resources can support. With the full build-out of the SWP a highly unlikely event, the Antelope Valley will be forced to confront the realities of water scarcity. The logic of temperate landscaping in the Mojave Desert will deservedly be challenged.

Antelope Valley water tanks

Neither local planners nor the Waterworks have authority to limit water use. As a result, Antelope Valley households have a consumption rate many times higher than households in non-desert areas. Average daily consumption in Lancaster is 1,100 gallons per housing unit, or 415 gallons per person. [Footnote #58] Considering that during the height of the recent drought, Marin County residents in the San Francisco Bay Area made do with fifty gallons per day per person, water use in the Antelope Valley is nothing short of gluttonous. Summer use skyrockets to 1,600 gallons per day per dwelling unit. Most of that undoubtedly goes to maintaining green lawns and temperate climate trees in the scorching Mojave sun.

At best, Palmdale planners have responded to the realities of their desert locale by “encouraging” xeriscaping (low-water use landscaping). But they lack the power to enforce this by financial incentives; a few pages in the city plan and some demonstration xeriscaping on city property is as far as the city can push water conservation. With pumping water for residential use both legal and relatively affordable, neither financial nor governmental structures exist to bring about a more sustainable, bioregion-specific water use pattern.

The fragility of the Antelope Valley’s water supply is underscored by several factors. First is its reliance on the SWP , a 444-mile long link to Northern California. As this aqueduct runs through the Antelope Valley, it straddles the San Andreas Fault. Should there be a rupture on the aqueduct because of an earthquake, State water engineers expect that the aqueduct will be out of commission for a minimum of three months. Just in March 1995, a section of the aqueduct in the Valley collapsed after its embankment was undermined by storm flooding. A visit to the channel showed stagnant water sitting far below the usual waterline. Repairs were underway and flow was cut off for at least a month. The aqueduct’s fragility pointedly illustrates that the Antelope Valley, dependent as it is on imported water, is vulnerable to the loss of this crucial resource.

The California Aquaduct in the Antelope Valley.

Second is the Valley’s misuse of its groundwater reserve. With recharge waters mainly supplied by runoff from the surrounding mountains, properly managed aquifers may be able to supply the greater portion of residential needs if those residences can drastically cut their usage. Even so, groundwater is known to be threatened by more than just overdraft. “Fertilizer leeching, fuel leaks, improper disposal practices at military bases, … runoff from landfills, and toxic discharges in the Rosamond area” [Footnote #59] all threaten the usability of groundwater in the Antelope Valley. Should the region acquire the level of manufacturing industries it is currently seeking, groundwater contamination could become a very serious, and potentially debilitating, problem indeed.

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© Matt Jalbert 1995–2002