Portions of the Arizona Canal on the north side of the Salt River will be drained over the next month for annual maintenance and construction activities and to address monsoon damage on segments of the canal.

The maintenance and repair activities will impact some of SRP’s northside irrigation customers who will not receive water from the canals during the dry-up.

From Jan. 6–Feb. 8, crews will be repairing the canal lining from Arizona Falls at 56th Street and Indian School Road to 48th Street in the Phoenix and Scottsdale area. This will require Arizona Falls to be closed during this time.

Due to the unprecedented monsoons over the summer, portions of Arizona Canal were damaged. Crews will be working to repair the damage from Beeline Highway to the Indian Bend Siphon just west of Hayden Road.

To begin construction, crews will be in the canal using large nets to herd white amur fish and load them onto hauling tanks that will deliver them to other portions of the canal system. Weed-eating, white amur fish are used by SRP to control aquatic vegetation in its 131-mile canal system.

Front loaders and heavy equipment will be used to pull silt and dirt from the canal and move it to large dump trucks throughout the dry-up.

There will be signage posted on the Arizona Canal from 48th Street to the Beeline Highway where the canal banks will be closed to all traffic including bikes and pedestrians.

This northside dry-up will result in increased construction traffic on canal banks as SRP crews work to remove silt, replace concrete lining, repair gates and make repairs from the monsoon.

SRP is responsible for keeping its canal system in operating condition during normal water deliveries. Canal dry-ups allow SRP as well as other utilities and municipalities to perform construction and maintenance activities in and around the canals. SRP crews also will use the dry-up to examine the canals and underwater structures to look for evidence of invasive adult quagga mussels.