Qualla: San Vicente Dam

San Vicente Dam: Introduction

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Unknown authorUnknown author or not provided, Public domain. Between 2009 and 2014, crews added 117 feet to the top of a dam that had stood for seven decades. The San Vicente Dam, a concrete gravity structure on San Vicente Creek northeast of Lakeside, was built between 1941 and 1943. When it was completed, it stood 220 feet high and held 90,000 acre-feet of water behind its curved face. When the raise was finished, it stood 337 feet high and held 242,000 acre-feet. No dam in the United States had ever been raised by more. It was also the largest raise ever accomplished using roller-compacted concrete — a technique that had not existed when the original dam was poured. The engineers of the 1940s built for their generation. The engineers of the 2000s built on top of them.

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Image: Unknown authorUnknown author or not provided | Public domain

San Vicente Dam: The Original Dam

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Phil Konstantin, CC BY-SA 3.0. Construction on San Vicente Dam began in 1941, two years before the United States entered World War II. The City of San Diego needed water storage beyond what its existing facilities could hold, and San Vicente Creek offered a site where the canyon geometry would produce a tall, ...

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Image: Phil Konstantin | CC BY-SA 3.0

San Vicente Dam: The Raise

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Dirk Hansen, CC BY-SA 3.0. The project to raise San Vicente Dam was authorized in the early 2000s as part of San Diego's strategy to increase local water storage and reduce dependence on the imported Colorado River supply. The raise used roller-compacted concrete, a method in which dry concrete is spread i...

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Image: Dirk Hansen | CC BY-SA 3.0

San Vicente Dam: Storage as Insurance

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Nzeemin, CC BY-SA 3.0. San Diego imports most of its water — from the Colorado River via the Metropolitan Water District, and from the State Water Project via the same system. Local reservoirs exist not primarily to supply the city's daily needs but to provide a buffer when those imported supplies are ...

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Image: Nzeemin | CC BY-SA 3.0

San Vicente Dam: The Reservoir from Above

Sat, 28 Mar 2026 00:00:00 GMT

Photo credit Blervis, CC0. From altitude, San Vicente Reservoir reads as a long blue arc pressed into the chaparral hills northeast of Lakeside. At full pool, its surface area reaches 1,069 acres — more than a mile and a half at its longest extent. The concrete dam face is visible at lower altitudes, a cur...

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Image: Blervis | CC0