Dive Brief:
- Today's Los Angeles, always on the lookout for water, shares a bond with the original settlement of its founds. The settlement used an open channel called the Zanja Madre, or Mother Ditch, to bring needed water from the Los Angeles River.
- Now, it appears that construction workers digging for a project called Blossom Plaza in the city's Chinatown district have uncovered a piece of the city's hydro history.
- Over the years, the Zanja Madre was lined with brick and then encased, and that is what the workers uncovered.
Dive Insight:
Similarities to the first Zanja Madfre section unearthed, in 2005 for a light-rail line, make it likely this is another piece. The downside of history is that now work has been halted on the $100 million retail-residential development while the aqueduct's future is determined.