Vehicles Called Risk to Reservoir : Off-Road Use Will Contaminate Water Supply, Officials Fear

The mud flats and rocky stream beds of the area just north of the San Gabriel Reservoir provide challenging weekends of high-speed splashing, slipping and sliding for thousands of off-road vehicle enthusiasts.

But federal and county officials say that the thrills they thrive on may be creating a long-term risk to the water supplied from the reservoir to an estimated 2.5 million people from the San Gabriel Valley to Long Beach.

They contend that the off-road vehicle enthusiasts, who flock to a half-mile-wide, 2 1/2-mile-long strip creeping down the northwest corner of the reservoir, pose a strong threat of contaminating the water with oil, gasoline and cleaning solvents.

The county’s Main San Gabriel Basin watermaster’s office, which determines how much water can be pumped out of the basin each year, has suggested that the vehicles be moved out of the reservoir area and restricted to specific areas patrolled and monitored by the U.S. Forest Service.

200,000 Vehicles

About 200,000 off-road vehicles will be used on the disputed area this year, most of them on weekends when riders have to pay a $2 fee to enter the area, said Donald Stikkers, district ranger for the Forest Services’s Mt. Baldy Ranger District.

The Forest Service, which oversees vehicle activity in the area, agrees that some action is necessary and has begun a study to determine if moving the activity is feasible. Stikkers said he expects to present possible solutions to the watermaster’s office in about a month.

However, he said, it will take at least a year to formulate and implement any new policy, so off-road vehicle activity will be allowed to continue in the area at least for the time being.

Authorities stress that the contamination poses no immediate threat to the water supply. But the problem has grown worse as the level of the reservoir has dropped and riders in search of mud drive deeper into the reservoir, dripping and spilling contaminants as they go.

‘Only Source of Pure Water’

“This source of water (the reservoir) is the only source of pure water we have in the basin,” said Linn Magoffin, chairman of the watermaster’s office.

Magoffin said that if something is not done soon, the contamination level could rise above established safety standards and the water supply, which travels through a reservoir and river system from the mountains to the sea, could be imperiled.

The reservoir-river system is the main source of replenishment of ground water in the Upper San Gabriel Valley Basin, which starts at the mountains and extends south to Whittier Narrows.

Water travels from the reservoir to a spreading ground in Irwindale, then seeps into wells that serve most of the population from Azusa south to Whittier and from San Dimas west to Monterey Park.

Moving South

As it moves south, the water goes into another spreading ground at Whittier Narrows, and that water supplies wells that serve about half the population of the Central Basin, which runs from Commerce and Montebello to the Orange County line and from La Puente west to Long Beach.

“We don’t want to wipe out ORV activity in the mountains, but we’ve taken many years developing these dams, and you just don’t let a handful of ORV people in and jeopardize it,” Magoffin said.

Municipal water officials and suppliers who rely on the reservoir agree that something should be done to try to halt the contamination.

“We just want to stop the problem before the reservoir has to be monitored and the Health Department comes in and closes the entire area down. It’s called preventive maintenance,” said Tom Shollenberger, water superintendent for the city of Alhambra and a member of the nine-man watermaster’s office board.

“We’re really concerned about contamination from that area because we serve over 14,000 customers from there,” said Edward Heck, general manager of the Azusa Valley Water Co., one of two San Gabriel Valley suppliers that get water directly from the reservoir.

“It could be a catastrophe if significant contamination occurs,” he said.

Bill Temple, general manager of Covina Irrigating Co., a wholesaler who also gets his water directly from the reservoir and sells to 14 cities, water companies and agricultural interests, agrees.

“We’re all concerned because the possibility of reservoir contamination definitely exists,” Temple said.

“We get all our water from the wells, and we feel we have an obligation to maintain the purity of the water up there,” said Bob Berlien, water manager for the city of Arcadia.

After touring the area with members of the watermaster’s office board, Magoffin met with Stikkers in early November to discuss the problem and sent a letter to the U.S. Forest Service, which has jurisdiction over law enforcement in the area, suggesting that the off-road vehicles be moved out of the reservoir area.

The letter mentions cleaning solvents such as trichloroethylene, perchloroethylene and carbon tetrachloride, which are used to de-grease and clean engine parts and get into the water as vehicles pass over the mud flats.

“Since such products have historically been used in cleaning engine parts, it is possible that unrestricted use by ORV riders could result in serious contamination to the drinking water supply. A small portion of any of these hydrocarbons can contaminate a large quantity of water,” said the letter, dated Nov. 5.

The conditions Magoffin and Stikkers discussed were evident on a recent Sunday, when a steady stream of cars, trucks and four-wheel-drive trucks, some loaded with motorcycles, drove up winding, two-lane California 39.

In the Pit

After paying the $2 fee, riders entered the crowded parking lot that serves the designated off-road vehicle area, known as the Pit, which runs from the West Fork of the San Gabriel River to the upper portion of the reservoir’s flood plain.

Riders unloaded their vehicles and began fanning out, helter-skelter, along the bumpy terrain leading down to the reservoir. Some people had come just to watch and set up beach chairs and blankets just off California 39 on bluffs overlooking the drivers.

Four-wheel-drive trucks and motorcycles careened around and through streams and rocks, frequently becoming mired.

“They certainly do contaminate the area,” said Barbara Spence of Pasadena, a member of the Way We Goes 4-Wheel Club. Spence had come to the area in hopes of finding a new place for her club to ride.

‘Dirtying the Water’

“Their wheel hubs are lubricated and there’s grease inside the hubs. They also constantly get stuck in the mud, making the chances worse for dirtying the water,” Spence said, adding that her group prefers to drive in off-road areas in the San Bernardino Mountains and the desert, which have trails and are more family-oriented.

“This is a freeway for wheelers. It’s totally unsafe and it gives off-roading a bad name,” Spence said.

Two Forest Service rangers patrol the huge area as best they can, monitoring activity in a Jeep on weekends. They spend much of their time enforcing traffic and drunk-driving laws and asking picnickers to extinguish fires used to barbecue meals.

“It’s a circus here,” said Ranger Tom Bailey, who regularly works the area on weekends.

Slithering in the Mud

Around them, drivers slithered around in the mud, many of them drinking beer as they maneuvered their vehicles. Some could be seen cleaning air filters with solvents, then dumping the chemical into the water.

Three men, standing along the water, urinated into the reservoir. Dog splashed in nearby streams as friends ate picnic lunches, discarding trash and pouring leftover beer into the mud.

“We’ve got an approximate age range of 16 to 25, mostly male, no club affiliation and lots of intoxication,” said William Woodland, a Forest Service recreation resource officer. “They like to show off. It’s a macho highway.”

The off-road vehicle enthusiasts reacted with hostility and disgust when told of the proposal to move them away from reservoir. Most of the drivers denied that they were contaminating the area.

‘Really Do Some Damage’

They contend that that their vehicles are well sealed and that when they do overturn, which happens with some frequency, they are righted immediately so that no spills or leakage occur.

If they are forced to move out of the area, “we’ll go to the desert and really do some damage,” said one rider who refused to identify himself.

“If they close it, they’ll have problems keeping people out,” said David Mejia, 22, of Azusa, who has been riding in the area for about five years.

“Look at all the trucks here now!” he exclaimed, looking at a crowd of about 1,000.

Magoffin and Stikkers agree that activity should be moved away from the water storage area to one of several possible sites nearby.

‘Ideal Place’

“The ideal place for the riders would be where the potential contaminants don’t run into the main water collection area,” said Shollenberger of the Alhambra water department.

Magoffin and Stikkers have discussed the possibility of creating an artificial mud flat north of the reservoir and moving the vehicles there.

Construction of restrooms on the hillsides along the reservoir (there are only a few such facilities in the area, most of them some distance from the ORV area) and barriers to stop hillside riders from destroying vegetation also would help, they said.

However, at least one state official contends that it is too late to do anything about vehicle use in the area.

‘Five Years Too Late’

“If they’re squawking, it’s five years too late,” said Ed Waldheim, chairman of the state Off-Highway Motor Vehicle Recreation Commission, which is charged with advising the state Parks and Recreation director on off-road vehicle activities and expenditures.

Waldheim said that the state has put $1 million into the area since the commission was established in 1982, most of which has gone to help the Forest Service operate the area and for improvements such as paving the parking area.

Waldheim said the commission would rather the riders “stayed where they are because that’s what we’ve planned for. If you don’t give these people areas they want, they’ll go where they’re not supposed to.”

Magoffin and Stikkers hope they can reach a compromise that would both prevent further contamination and allow off-road vehicle activity to remain in the area.

“We want to work with the ORV people, and we just want to point out a potential problem that is a hazard for all of us,” said Alhambra’s Shollenberger. “It’s not critical now (but it will be) unless we act now. After all, it’s the riders’ own drinking water supply too, not just ours.”