Search

At the request of The Salt River Project, archeologists from the Museum of Northern Arizona surveyed 24 tower locations and their associated access roads for the 7.5 mile segment of the Coronado-Silverking 500 kV transmission line in the Sitgreaves National Forest. The request for the survey came from Bettina Rosenberg, archeological administrator for The Salt River Project, in a letter dated January 12, 1978. The Coronado-Silverking transmission line is the main conduit to the Phoenix metropolitan area for power generated at Coronado Station. Beginning at Coronado Station northeast of St. Johns, the transmission line shares a west running corridor with a Coronado-Cholla Station 500 kV "back-up" line. Northwest of Snowflake, the lines separate and the Silverking line continues West, entering the Sitgreaves National Forest. The 7.5 mile survey segment is the portion of the 200 feet wide Silverking line corridor between the Sitgreaves National Forest boundary on the east and the joint corridor on the west. Museum archeologists initially surveyed the entire 7.5 mile long, 200 feet wide corridor in December, 1977. During the December work, 23 archeological sites were discovered and recorded. The Museum performed the original corridor survey to provide archeological data for tower placement planning by Salt River Project. The purpose of the present survey is to assess the potential impacts of tower access and construction, and of cable stringing. Defined by the Sitgreaves National Forest in their Cultural Resources Plan for Coronado Project, the impact zones of the Silverking line are a 200 feet radius around each tower hub, the access roadway plus a 50 feet buffer on either side, and the entire tensioning sites plus a 50 feet surrounding buffer. The present survey required 3 days to complete, beginning on January 28, and ending on January 30, 1978. Six additional sites were discovered, mostly within or near the initial access road impact zones. In each case, the road corridors were restricted to avoid the archeological remains. One site, found within the previously surveyed corridor, was defined during a reassessment of a previously recorded site. According to the guidelines agreed upon between the Sitgreaves National Forest and the Salt River Project, no sites found during this or the previous survey will suffer direct impact from construction of the Coronado-Silverking line. There are particular tower locations where extreme caution must be exercised, however, during construction, and the Museum recommends that earthmoving, and in a few cases tower erection, be monitored rigorously by a professional archeologist.