Over time, the flow of the Colorado River has decreased as the river has been dammed, diverted, and altered to serve the expanding human populations in the area. Cities like Phoenix and Los Angeles, for example, cannot support their populations from the water naturally available in their areas; therefore, the cities built aqueducts to channel some of the water to these growing population centers. However, this has left the downstream portions of the Colorado River parched. In fact, the Colorado River, running from the Rocky Mountains to the Gulf of California, has not actually reached the Gulf of California since 1998. Climate change models predict a an additional decrease in the river’s streamflow by 10-30%, exacerbating these effects.
