On a scorching day in June 2013, the Grand Canyon discouraged hikers from attempting a long trek down because there was reportedly no drinking water. A number of historic cabins and bunkhouses were also reportedly closed overnight due to a water main break.
The incident was one of more than 85 fractures in the 20-kilometer-long Transcanyon Waterline, which supplies drinking water to the South Rim of the Grand Canyon and inner canyon, has been taking place since 2010. Completed in 1970, the pipeline has long exceeded its designed lifespan of 30 years, disrupting operations in one of the U.S.’s most popular national parks.
The pipeline has remained a leaky, shaky, yet vital infrastructure for millions of visitors. This year, after multiple interruptions, officials imposed water restrictions and canceled overnight stays at busy hotelswhich disrupted summer vacation during Labor Day weekend.
A long-term solution is expected around 2027, but it has taken decades to get to that point. The long timeline is due to a complex design process and the challenge of financing expensive projects at the National Park Service, which has struggled with mountains of deferred maintenance, according to experts familiar with the history.
“It just takes a while for something of this magnitude,” said Robert Parrish, chief planning, environmental and projects officer at Grand Canyon National Park. He added that it’s not just the park service that’s involved: It can take utilities 10 to 15 years to start construction on major projects.
Recent stays at the El Tovar Hotel, Bright Angel Lodge and other hotels on the canyon’s south rim were halted for about a week as crews scrambled to repair four breaks in the water line.
The Transcanyon Pipeline twists and turns across the canyon’s rugged terrain. For years, the Park Service has repaired pipeline ruptures caused by falling rocks, freezing temperatures, flash floods and other causes on an ad hoc basis, Parrish said. A 2015 estimate suggested that the pipeline had suffered five to 30 ruptures per year over the previous three decades. They cost an average of about $25,000 each.
According to Dan Cockrum, who was the park’s chief of maintenance and engineering for nearly a decade until 1993, it’s nothing like repairing most pipelines.
Helicopters had to ferry workers to the leak. They would measure the thickness and bend of the damaged pipe, go back to the edge and cut a replacement piece, then go back down to install the new section, he recalled.
Leaks occurred a few times a year. Around the time Cockrum left that job, engineers were studying replacing the entire thing or its most vulnerable parts, because it was suffering from stress fractures and corrosion and was nearing the end of its useful life. But the plan for a major overhaul was not adopted.
“When you’re under-resourced, it comes down to a kind of triage approach,” said Ernie Atencio, Southwest regional director for the National Parks Conservation Association and a former Grand Canyon Ranger. “You do the best you can, as long as you can. And sometimes things blow up.”
In the short term, a piecemeal approach may have made economic sense. A few repairs a year were significantly cheaper than the tens of millions of dollars for a replacement project, said Greg MacGregor, who led the park’s project management team from 2006 to 2017.
According to Parrish, the thinking shifted to a permanent solution in the early 2010s.
“Instead of looking at a bunch of small repair projects, the teams really moved to ‘how can we replace the entire system?’” he said.
MacGregor recalls a massive brainstorming process to find the best option and years of analysis on how to solve the complex problem of moving scarce water to the South Rim.
The park service rushed to fix the brakes, some of which were bigger than others, and slowly saved money for a major overhaul, Parrish said. “There was too much to do at once.”
In 2018, the National Park Service released an environmental impact statement, asked for public input, and the following year officials approved a more comprehensive solution. The Transcanyon Waterline project involves replacing about 3 miles (5 kilometers) of pipe in the canyon, upgrading 3 miles (5 kilometers) of power line in the canyon, building a water intake in a new location, and updating water treatment and electrical systems.
Officials say the project will ensure the park can meet its water needs for the next 50 years or more.
Funding was one of the biggest hurdles. The park’s maintenance backlog continued to grow during MacGregor’s tenure, and he recalls Congress being reluctant to write a big check. The park would eventually contribute from visitor fees. In 2018, costs went up, in part to pay for the pipeline.
National parks in the U.S. fund costly maintenance efforts primarily through Congress, but also through donations, charities and park fees. Large parks like the Grand Canyon, which is expected to welcome nearly 5 million visitors in 2023, don’t keep all of what they collect from admissions; larger parks distribute some of the costs to smaller parks, many of which don’t charge visitors. Grand Canyon keeps 80% of its visitor fees, Parrish said.
A $208 million construction contract was awarded in 2023. Congress has appropriated more than $70 million for the project, but most of it will come from parks funds, Parrish said.
“The sheer scale of this project may well be the answer to why it took so long to decide, plan and execute,” he said.
Over the years, breaks have taken their toll.
Wendy Haluda is a former baker at El Tovar Hotel, where guests could order a filet mignon with a demi glace for $54 this spring. After a pipeline rupture in 2016, water restrictions forced the restaurant to wash fewer dishes and use paper plates and plastic cutlery. And Haluda recalled that staff worried about where they would go if conditions deteriorated to the point that they could not stay overnight in their park housing.
“It was scary,” she recalls.
Necessary repairs, maintenance and replacement of infrastructure like the Grand Canyon pipeline are a nationwide problem. The Park Service has a maintenance backlog of nearly $23 billion for aging infrastructure.
More than half of that is for roadwork and maintaining buildings in national parks, with the remainder for water systems, trails, campgrounds and infrastructure such as wastewater treatment.
The Grand Canyon has a $823 million backlog for maintenance and repairs, primarily for building and trail maintenance.
The Great American Outdoors Act of 2020 provided billions in additional funding, but it will expire soon if Congress does not renew the law.
According to Tate Watkins, a researcher at the Property and Environment Research Center think tank, much of the park infrastructure is more than 70 years old and has been neglected.
“People like to cut ribbons at new national parks,” he said. “But it’s a lot less sexy to talk about fixing sewers or, you know, rebuilding a water pipeline for the Grand Canyon.”
___
Associated Press reporter Rio Yamat contributed from Las Vegas. Researcher Rhonda Shafner contributed from New York.
___
The Associated Press receives support for its water and environmental policy coverage from the Walton Family Foundation. The AP is solely responsible for all content. For all of AP’s environmental coverage, visit https://apnews.com/hub/climate-and-environment.