Course of the Colorado River Lake Mead, formed by the -high Hoover Dam about southeast of Las Vegas, Nevada, is the largest reservoir in the United States with a full capacity of and a water surface of nearly . However, the lake has not been full for many years due to a combination of drought and increased water usage by Colorado River Basin states. Situated in the Lake Mead National Recreation Area, Lake Mead is a popular recreation site – visited by almost 8 million people a year – and a critical source of water for the Las Vegas metropolitan area, Central Arizona and Southern
Glen Canyon Dam the Colorado's major upper tributary, at Echo Park and Split Mountain. The 1956 Colorado River Storage Project Act authorized the purposes of "regulating the flow of the Colorado River, storing water for beneficial consumptive use, providing for reclamation of arid and semi-arid lands, providing flood control, and generating hydropower." The proposal for Glen Canyon Dam was most vocally supported by the state of Arizona, which wished to get Colorado River water to Phoenix and Tucson, located hundreds of miles away from the Colorado in the center of the state. Glen Canyon Dam would regulate river flow between Lee's Ferry and