ASCE will be sunsetting the Civil Engineering Database (CEDB) in the coming months. We encourage you to start using the ASCE Library to perform content searches. In the ASCE Library, you can save your search results as well as receive email content alerts when new content relevant to your area of interest is published. Try it out today at https://ascelibrary.org.

 

Political and Institutional Constraints on Water Resources Studies

by Jon G. Sweeten, U.S. Army Corps of Engineers, Los Angeles, United States,



Document Type: Proceeding Paper

Part of: Water Resources Planning and Management and Urban Water Resources

Abstract:

Urban water resource planning studies are conducted by the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers at the request of a local sponsor, frequently in order to address a specific problem. The public often desires an evaluation of a wider variety of objectives, but these objectives sometimes fall outside the responsibility of the local sponsor. In these cases, it is more expedient to maintain a narrow study scope and thus achieve the goals of developing a supportable project and satisfying the study sponsor. Political support for the study is also better served when a local problem is clearly defined and a solution is presented. To accommodate the local partner who needs to share responsibility for the project cost, the Corps is trying to streamline the study process. In doing so, Corps studies may become increasingly single objective. This promotes multiple studies on a single project location, each developing individual plans that accomplish specific goals. This loss of a coordinated analysis will be an impediment to providing well-conceived, coordinated future water resource projects.

Subject Headings: Water resources | Political factors | Water policy | Project management | Water management | Water leakage and water loss | United States Army Corps of Engineers | United States

Services: Buy this book/Buy this article

 

Return to search