Environmental Engineering Reference
In-Depth Information
and fi gure 3.1). The dam projects created jobs and provided residents
in the region with much needed water and electricity services as well as
fl ood control. 26 Austin historian Anthony Orum notes: “Harboring few
natural resources that could be mined for their wealth and usefulness, set
in a wooded, hilly landscape, bedecked with rivers and lakes, Austin was
a prisoner of its environment, yet one that enjoyed its fate. But the dams
had changed all that. They had made possible a control of the rivers and
industry that could use the electric power they harnessed. They had made
life livable in Austin, and throughout the rest of Central Texas.” 27
Refl ecting on the damming of the Colorado River, Johnson stated in
1958:
Of all the endeavors on which I have worked in public life, I am proudest of the
accomplishment in developing the Colorado River. It is not the damming of the
streams or the harnessing of the fl oods in which I take pride, but rather in the end-
ing of the waste of the region. The region—so unproductive in my youth—is now
a vital part of the national economy and potential. More important, the wastage of
human resources in the whole region has been reduced. Men and women have been
released from the waste of drudgery and toil against the unyielding rocks of the
Texas hills. This is the true fulfi llment of the true responsibility of government. 28
Johnson's emphasis on “waste” and “productivity” refl ects the central
themes of the Progressive era at the turn of the twentieth century as well
as New Deal politics in the 1930s and 1940s. Undoubtedly, he was a great
believer in the Promethean Project as a means to fulfi ll the progressive goal
of a more prosperous future.
Once the dams were in place, the latent potential of Austin as an attrac-
tive Sunbelt city could be realized by the municipal government, the Cham-
ber of Commerce, and other regional development interests. 29 The city now
had a stable foundation on which to expand its economic base beyond
its original economic pillars of state government and higher education to
include light manufacturing and, more important, the high-tech sector. The
region quickly received national attention for its economic development
potential, as evidenced in a 1950 New York Herald Tribune article: “A
sizeable block of the people of the United States (estimated conservatively
up in the millions) today are conscious of the fact that there is such a place
as Austin, Texas, and that at and near Austin are a series of fresh water
lakes nestling in the picturesque hills, which not only provide opportunities
for outstanding recreation, but also contain ample water for development
of cities, agriculture and commercial and industrial projects.” 30
With stable municipal services and a burgeoning recreation economy
from the Highland Lakes, the Austin population surged. From 1940 to
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