As we embark on another investigative assignment at the Hanging Flume next week in Colorado, we found this interesting article from Bob Silbernagel of the Grand Junction Sentinel: Gold ambitions led to Marvel of Engineering in Dolores Canyon. A century after the flume was abandoned, an effort began to preserve it. The nonprofit Interpretive Association of […]
Uravan, CO A 13-mile long remnant of a hanging flume built over three years in the 1880’s, the flume carried water to the hydraulic mining operations of the Montrose Placer Mining Company. The water was used to provide hydraulic power to separate gold from alluvial rock deposits originating in the San Juan mountains, but after […]
What is the Hanging Flume? In western Colorado, an engineering marvel of a bygone era clings to sheer canyon walls along seven miles of the Dolores River. The Hanging Flume was built in the 1880s to divert water for gold mining, but the exact method of its construction remains a mystery. How was this immense […]
Kent Diebolt was in Denver on the evening of February 5th to help celebrate the Stephen H. Hart Awards for Historic Preservation, honoring the Western Colorado Interperative Association, Anthony & Associates and the Bureau of Land Management for their work and leadership on the Hanging Flume project. Vertical Access has been involved since 2004. [vimeo […]
By Kathy Jordan, The Daily Sentinel, Grand Junction, CO Thursday, April 5, 2012 The hanging flume, of which 7 of its 13 miles clings to a red-rock wall along the San Miguel River in the San Miguel and Dolores Rivers canyons, might leave viewers wondering why and when this wooden structure was built. …However, except […]
Driving along the San Miguel River near the historic town of Uravan in western Colorado, one has to study the cliffs to find remnants of a 10 mile long structure built 120 years ago. Constructed by the Montrose Placer Mining Company between 1889 and 1891, the Hanging Flume ended its service life in 1903 and […]
There is something about the tattered remnants of a 126-year-old mining marvel that keeps drawing the curious back to this remote area along Colorado 141 located in Colorado Canyon Country, mostly on public lands operated by the Bureau of Land Management, Uncompahgre Field office. Those who keep returning to measure, survey, photograph and examine the […]
Picture a manmade water channel 10 miles long, able to carry up to 80 million gallons of water a day. Then consider what it would take to affix the lion’s share of that wood and iron structure to the side of serpentine, vertical canyon walls, 100 feet off the ground, weaving through the desert in […]
Catching Flume Fever by Mara Ferris of Gen 9 Productions Never realizing its rich history, I have stopped many times along the Unaweep-Tabeguache Scenic byway to view the remnants of the spectacular wooden structure hanging high on the red rock walls above the San Miguel and Dolores Rivers. As a filmmaker based in Western Colorado […]
Vertical Access is proud to have been on the award-winning teams for the following projects. Boston Society of Architects 2012 Design Award – Citation: Technical Merit Gasson Hall Tower, Boston College Building Design + Construction 2013 Reconstruction Award, Silver Conrad B. Duberstein U.S. Bankruptcy Courthouse – Brooklyn, NY 2013 Reconstruction Award, Silver Marble Collegiate Church […]