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Van Sickle Island

Islands of Northern CaliforniaIslands of Solano County, CaliforniaIslands of Suisun BayIslands of the San Francisco Bay Area
USGS Aerial imagery of Van Sickle Island, California
USGS Aerial imagery of Van Sickle Island, California

Van Sickle Island is an approximately 10,000-acre (4,000 ha) island in Suisun Bay, California. It is part of Solano County, and administered by Reclamation District 1607. Its coordinates are 38°04′00″N 121°54′04″W, and in 1981 the United States Geological Survey recorded its elevation as 0 ft (0 m). The island's land is divided into 22 privately-owned parcels, used primarily for duck clubs and private residences. A railroad bridge constructed in 1913 once connected it to Montezuma and Chipps Island, from which a ferry connected to Mallard Island and Pittsburg. The rail service was discontinued and the bridges no longer exist; currently, the island is accessible by water, as well as by road on bridges from Hammond Island and Wheeler Island.

Excerpt from the Wikipedia article Van Sickle Island (License: CC BY-SA 3.0, Authors, Images).

Geographical coordinates (GPS)

Latitude Longitude
N 38.066666666667 ° E -121.90111111111 °
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California, United States
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USGS Aerial imagery of Van Sickle Island, California
USGS Aerial imagery of Van Sickle Island, California
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Chipps Island
Chipps Island

Chipps Island is a small island in Suisun Bay, California. It is part of Solano County. It is also known as Knox Island, Its coordinates are 38°03′19″N 121°54′43″W by which name it appears on an 1850 survey map of the San Francisco Bay area made by Cadwalader Ringgold, as well as an 1854 map of the area by Henry Lange. In 1959, the state of California used Chipps Island in a legal definition of the western boundary of the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta.In 1960s, during efforts to devise large-scale hydrological engineering projects in San Francisco Bay and adjacent estuaries, Chipps Island was proposed as the site of a dam across the Carquinez Strait as a "more feasible" alternative to the very expensive Reber Plan. The Chipps Island dam was estimated to cost $194,400,000 in 1963 ($1.86 billion in 2022), and retain 1,380,000 acre⋅ft (1.70×109 m3) of fresh water (which would otherwise be emptied into the Pacific Ocean). However, the project faced barriers to implementation, including potential hazards to wildlife (as it was expected to cause the flow of the San Joaquin River to reverse during part of salmon's migration period, preventing them from swimming upstream). The Sacramento Bee quoted "state fish and wildlife experts" as saying that the "seriousness of this apparently insolvable problem" was significant enough to "postpone further investigation of the other effects of the Chipps Island plan". By 1964, new plans from the Inter-Agency Delta Committee had "discarded" the Chipps Island water barrier in plans for managing freshwater in the region.Chipps Island is located close to hydrocarbon deposits, and in 1967, bids were opened for oil and gas rights on parcels in the vicinity of the island.While a duck club had once operated on Chipps Island, it was in disuse by the mid-1970s; in 1974, police arrested a "bustling" ring of illicit amphetamine producers using the abandoned structures to store large amounts of the stimulant.In the 2010s, Chipps Island was part of a large purchase of Delta land attempted by the Metropolitan Water District of Southern California (along with nearby Bouldin and Bacon Islands, as well as much of the Holland and Webb Tracts). The district was subsequently sued by several northern California environmental groups, water agencies, and the counties of Contra Costa and San Joaquin.

Sacramento River
Sacramento River

The Sacramento River (Spanish: Río Sacramento) is the principal river of Northern California in the United States and is the largest river in California. Rising in the Klamath Mountains, the river flows south for 400 miles (640 km) before reaching the Sacramento–San Joaquin River Delta and San Francisco Bay. The river drains about 26,500 square miles (69,000 km2) in 19 California counties, mostly within the fertile agricultural region bounded by the Coast Ranges and Sierra Nevada known as the Sacramento Valley, but also extending as far as the volcanic plateaus of Northeastern California. Historically, its watershed has reached as far north as south-central Oregon where the now, primarily, endorheic (closed) Goose Lake rarely experiences southerly outflow into the Pit River, the most northerly tributary of the Sacramento. The Sacramento and its wide natural floodplain were once abundant in fish and other aquatic creatures, notably one of the southernmost large runs of chinook salmon in North America. For about 12,000 years, humans have depended on the vast natural resources of the watershed, which had one of the densest Native American populations in California. The river has provided a route for trade and travel since ancient times. Hundreds of tribes sharing regional customs and traditions have inhabited the Sacramento Valley, first coming into contact with European explorers in the late 1700s. The Spanish explorer Gabriel Moraga named the river Rio de los Sacramentos in 1808, later shortened and anglicized into Sacramento. In the 19th century, gold was discovered on a tributary of the Sacramento River, starting the California Gold Rush and an enormous population influx to the state. Overland trails such as the California Trail and Siskiyou Trail guided hundreds of thousands of people to the gold fields. By the late part of the century mining had ceased to be a major part of the economy, and many immigrants turned to farming and ranching. Many populous communities were established along the Sacramento River, including the state capital of Sacramento. Intensive agriculture and mining contributed to pollution in the Sacramento River, and significant changes to the river's hydrology and environment. Since the 1950s the watershed has been intensely developed for water supply and the generation of hydroelectric power. Today, large dams impound the river and almost all of its major tributaries. The Sacramento River is used heavily for irrigation and serves much of Central and Southern California through the canals of giant state and federal water projects. While it is now providing water to over half of California's population and supporting the most productive agricultural area in the nation, these changes have left the Sacramento greatly modified from its natural state and have caused the decline of its once-abundant fisheries.