Groundwater Depletion Beneath Downtown Tucson, Arizona: A 240-Year Record.

Beginning with the foundation date of Spanish Tucson in 1775 and continuing through the 1890s, shallow groundwater and related features, including a perched aquifer, stream-bed springs and a short perennial reach in the Santa Cruz River, progressively disappeared from the Downtown Tucson area. The 20th-Century city grew rapidly, and increasing groundwater withdrawals caused large declines in the regional aquifer of Tucson basin, leaving a second perched aquifer with non-aqueous contaminants beneath Downtown. Isotope data show that this fully perched aquifer retains residual water from the regional aquifer, plus recharge derived from a nearby small watercourse. The present regional aquifer beneath Downtown is locally layered and partly confined, and contains water 7-20 Ka years old originating at the northern and southeastern basin margins. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]