What if Arizona had a coast?

[Cherico]

This is a map of north america the gaston purchase gave america this land

But lets say the negiotations go better and instead of going up the strait line goes strait and includes everything to the river. Arizona now has a coast how would this change Arizona as a state and world history?

 

[WolfBear]

Arizona would have some very fine beaches with some hott bikini babes, no? And a much shorter border with Mexico.

 

[Skallagrim]

I assume the USA gets Baja California, too. This means that California probably becomes two states from the start. And the Southern one (with Los Angeles as its Northernmost city) is going to be a slave state by default. Although possibly not a very enthousiastic one.

The coast of Arizona is in a poor location, since any ship has to go around the peninsula anyway. And since trains are up and coming around this time, using Californian ports and taking stuff East by rail-road from there is just going to be more convenient.

But Arizona will have a coast, and it's a sunny coast. So they can set themselves up as a nice alternative to California in that regard. "Great beaches... and no annoying Californians!"

 

[Buba]

Yuma would be a port - maybe the Gila and/or Colorado have work done them to improve navigation?
I disagree - IMO it'd intercept part of the traffic going OTL to San Diego and Los Angeles. Depends on when RR are built to where. If Yuma gets RR before LA/SD then the south Californian ports might be stillborn, or at least do not grow to OTL size.
San Diego might not become an USN base, if there is something more suitable on the Peninsula.

Arizona gets more Anglos sooner and its statehood is accelerated?

 

[WolfBear]

I assume the USA gets Baja California, too. This means that California probably becomes two states from the start. And the Southern one (with Los Angeles as its Northernmost city) is going to be a slave state by default. Although possibly not a very enthousiastic one.

The coast of Arizona is in a poor location, since any ship has to go around the peninsula anyway. And since trains are up and coming around this time, using Californian ports and taking stuff East by rail-road from there is just going to be more convenient.

But Arizona will have a coast, and it's a sunny coast. So they can set themselves up as a nice alternative to California in that regard. "Great beaches... and no annoying Californians!"

How many people do you think that Baja California will have?

And as for Arizona's coastline, can't a canal be built through the northern part of Baja California?

 

[Sailor.X]

So back to the Miocene Epoch again????

And for that matter the Permian and the Late Cretaceous Period.

 

[Skallagrim]

How many people do you think that Baja California will have?

Quite many, since I think it would include the bulk of OTL Southern California. But a lot depends on what route is used for the trans-continental rail-road.

And as for Arizona's coastline, can't a canal be built through the northern part of Baja California?

That strikes me as very impractical.

 

[Buba]

can't a canal be built through the northern part of Baja California?

Not economically viable.

 

[Atarlost]

The coast of Arizona is in a poor location, since any ship has to go around the peninsula anyway. And since trains are up and coming around this time, using Californian ports and taking stuff East by rail-road from there is just going to be more convenient.

Trains being up and coming doesn't mean they immediately supplant ships as the cheap means of moving goods. Even now goods from Europe meant for the west coast or from China meant for the east coast transit the Panama Canal rather than landing in the closest port and crossing the nation by rail. And anything from South America or Europe destined for anywhere in the American Southwest closer to the Gulf of California than the Gulf of Mexico would be cheaper to ship to Puerto Peñasco or Golfo de Santa Clara (which would certainly be called something else since they were founded in the 1930s after the rail line between Baja California and the rest of Mexico went in) even if it was cheaper to ship from Asia or more northern west coast ports to LA or San Diego and on by rail. If you're coming up from Panama or points south it's just as easy to sail to a port on the east of the Baja California peninsula as one on the west.

 

[Skallagrim]

Trains being up and coming doesn't mean they immediately supplant ships as the cheap means of moving goods. Even now goods from Europe meant for the west coast or from China meant for the east coast transit the Panama Canal rather than landing in the closest port and crossing the nation by rail. And anything from South America or Europe destined for anywhere in the American Southwest closer to the Gulf of California than the Gulf of Mexico would be cheaper to ship to Puerto Peñasco or Golfo de Santa Clara (which would certainly be called something else since they were founded in the 1930s after the rail line between Baja California and the rest of Mexico went in) even if it was cheaper to ship from Asia or more northern west coast ports to LA or San Diego and on by rail. If you're coming up from Panama or points south it's just as easy to sail to a port on the east of the Baja California peninsula as one on the west.

The distances involved make this case a no-brainer, though. If you're coming up or down the West Coast, you can stop in (say) Los Angeles and then move on. If you go to the mouth of the Colorado instead, you then first have to needlessly move up the length of the peninsula if you're coming from the North and want to keep going South afterwards, or you have to needlessly move up the length of the peninsula afterwards if you're coming from the South and want to keep going North. Therefore, a port on the "outside" of the stupidly long peninsula is way more sensible.

Meanwile, verything coming from across the Pacific is either going to be carried by ship around the Americas altogether (in which case the location of a port on the West Coast is immaterial), or going to be off-loaded on the West Coast, in which case it's going to be carried East by train (in which case the extra few hundred miles are really not going to matter all that much).

I mentioned trains because before trains, the inconvenience of "going around the peninsula" might well out-weight the trouble of having to haul a lot of shit over-land for those extra few hundred miles. But hat logic no longer holds up when there's rail-roads, and the stuff is going to be put on a train wagon anyway. Doing it in San Diego makes way more sense than building a port at the mouth of the Colorado.

As such, there are various reasons why choosing to put your port on the "inside" of the Peninsula is a stupid idea, and exactly zero reasons why it's a better idea than just putting your port(s) at Los Angeles and/or San Diego.

 

[Bear Ribs]

There's still an extremely massive advantage to going to Arizona's coast. The extra distance is minor, but once at the mouth of the river cargo can be transferred to river barges and towed upstream for a tiny fraction of the cost of putting it on trains. San Diego by contrast is going to have to haul cargo up and down mountain ranges to get to the rest of the US, at tremendous expense.

Water travel, even against the current on a river, really is just staggeringly cheaper and more efficient than any form of land transportation, to a degree few people ever realize.

 

[Cherico]

The distances involved make this case a no-brainer, though. If you're coming up or down the West Coast, you can stop in (say) Los Angeles and then move on. If you go to the mouth of the Colorado instead, you then first have to needlessly move up the length of the peninsula if you're coming from the North and want to keep going South afterwards, or you have to needlessly move up the length of the peninsula afterwards if you're coming from the South and want to keep going North. Therefore, a port on the "outside" of the stupidly long peninsula is way more sensible.

Meanwile, verything coming from across the Pacific is either going to be carried by ship around the Americas altogether (in which case the location of a port on the West Coast is immaterial), or going to be off-loaded on the West Coast, in which case it's going to be carried East by train (in which case the extra few hundred miles are really not going to matter all that much).

I mentioned trains because before trains, the inconvenience of "going around the peninsula" might well out-weight the trouble of having to haul a lot of shit over-land for those extra few hundred miles. But hat logic no longer holds up when there's rail-roads, and the stuff is going to be put on a train wagon anyway. Doing it in San Diego makes way more sense than building a port at the mouth of the Colorado.

As such, there are various reasons why choosing to put your port on the "inside" of the Peninsula is a stupid idea, and exactly zero reasons why it's a better idea than just putting your port(s) at Los Angeles and/or San Diego.

While true, if you already have a coast some place why not have a minor port city in place?

 

[Skallagrim]

There's still an extremely massive advantage to going to Arizona's coast. The extra distance is minor, but once at the mouth of the river cargo can be transferred to river barges and towed upstream for a tiny fraction of the cost of putting it on trains. San Diego by contrast is going to have to haul cargo up and down mountain ranges to get to the rest of the US, at tremendous expense.

Water travel, even against the current on a river, really is just staggeringly cheaper and more efficient than any form of land transportation, to a degree few people ever realize.

While true, if you already have a coast some place why not have a minor port city in place?

There's literally nothing there in OTL. I realise that the fact that it's in Mexico while the Colorado River's hinterlands are in the USA, but still -- this would be a place where Mexico could profit from owning the access point to the US hinterland, wouldn't it? If a port there is so useful, then why isn't there anything there?

The fact is, the USA undertook the Gadsden Purchase with the aim of a trans-continental route in mind. That was the foremost reason to even buy that area. And did they even try to get the supposedly valuable mouth of the Colorado? Nope. Why not? Because that was never even considered as a terminus point for the rail-road.

Look at the map:

The Californian bits of the Southern Pacific route were the first ones actually put in place. They were always going to build that. Even if they got more land in the Gadsden Purchase... the rail-road would still be built to go from LA to Yuma, and further East from there.

So if the rail-road is there anyway, the only meaningful question is: would it be more opportune to off-load stuff in LA and move it to Yuma by train, or to go around the peninsula, off-load it at the mouth of the Colorado, transfer everything to a river-boat, move it up the river to Yuma, and then put it on a train?

The answer is very obvious to me: with this short additional rail distance, and with the rail being built anyway, the first option is clearly way less trouble. So a port at the mouth of the Colorado just doesn't offer a meaningful economic benefit. (And if it did, there would be at least a tiny port there in OTL. But look on Google Maps. There's nothing there. Not even a tiny village.)

 

[Bear Ribs]

There's literally nothing there in OTL. I realise that the fact that it's in Mexico while the Colorado River's hinterlands are in the USA, but still -- this would be a place where Mexico could profit from owning the access point to the US hinterland, wouldn't it? If a port there is so useful, then why isn't there anything there?

The fact is, the USA undertook the Gadsden Purchase with the aim of a trans-continental route in mind. That was the foremost reason to even buy that area. And did they even try to get the supposedly valuable mouth of the Colorado? Nope. Why not? Because that was never even considered as a terminus point for the rail-road.

Look at the map:

The Californian bits of the Southern Pacific route were the first ones actually put in place. They were always going to build that. Even if they got more land in the Gadsden Purchase... the rail-road would still be built to go from LA to Yuma, and further East from there.

So if the rail-road is there anyway, the only meaningful question is: would it be more opportune to off-load stuff in LA and move it to Yuma by train, or to go around the peninsula, off-load it at the mouth of the Colorado, transfer everything to a river-boat, move it up the river to Yuma, and then put it on a train?

The answer is very obvious to me: with this short additional rail distance, and with the rail being built anyway, the first option is clearly way less trouble. So a port at the mouth of the Colorado just doesn't offer a meaningful economic benefit. (And if it did, there would be at least a tiny port there in OTL. But look on Google Maps. There's nothing there. Not even a tiny village.)

We probably need a picture to explain it to you. This is the Colorado River at the Mexico Border:

Due to California sucking down all the water, the river hasn't actually reached the ocean in well over half a century ( I believe technically some trickles made it through in 2009 or something but nothing usable). That rather puts a damper on the usefulness of a port city.

As for not even a village there...

May I recommend seeing your eye doctor?

 

[Skallagrim]

Due to California sucking down all the water, the river hasn't actually reached the ocean in well over half a century ( I believe technically some trickles made it through in 2009 or something but nothing usable). That rather puts a damper on the usefulness of a port city.

There was nothing there before California started sucking up all the Colorado's water, either. Mexico clearly did see border-towns grow into veritable cities due to cross-border opportunities. There are loads of examples of that. So if the Colorado was such a great access point (up until half-way through the 20th century, anyway)... why didn't anything pop up there? Where's the harbour?

It's not there. It was never there. Because it's a dumb-ass place to put a harbour. They didn't even put anything there when they owned all of California. They did put ports on the Western coast, "outside" the peninsula, where I've been saying any sane person would put a port...

As for not even a village there...

May I recommend seeing your eye doctor?

That's 60 km inland, and completely useless as a sea-port. Closer to the mouth of the river, where you'd have to put a sea-port, there is nothing, and never has been anything.

 

[WolfBear]

That strikes me as very impractical.

Not economically viable.

What about a canal further north, in what is present-day southern California? If the Pacific Ocean is connected to the Colorado River and then another canal connects the Colorado River with a branch of the Mississippi River, then we could get steamship travel from coast to coast in the US, no? :

We do have the Panama Canal, but it involves going a long distance to the south and then back up to the north.

 

[Skallagrim]

What about a canal further north, in what is present-day southern California? If the Pacific Ocean is connected to the Colorado River and then another canal connects the Colorado River with a branch of the Mississippi River, then we could get steamship travel from coast to coast in the US, no?

There's a bunch of giant honking mountains along the continental divide.

 

[Bear Ribs]

There was nothing there before California started sucking up all the Colorado's water, either. Mexico clearly did see border-towns grow into veritable cities due to cross-border opportunities. There are loads of examples of that. So if the Colorado was such a great access point (up until half-way through the 20th century, anyway)... why didn't anything pop up there? Where's the harbour?

It's not there. It was never there. Because it's a dumb-ass place to put a harbour. They didn't even put anything there when they owned all of California. They did put ports on the Western coast, "outside" the peninsula, where I've been saying any sane person would put a port...


That's 60 km inland, and completely useless as a sea-port. Closer to the mouth of the river, where you'd have to put a sea-port, there is nothing, and never has been anything.

Quit. Lying.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/San_Luis_R%C3%ADo_Colorado

San Luis Río Colorado was once an important inland port for steamers traveling the Colorado from the Gulf of California. Since the early 1900s the Colorado has been completely or nearly completely drained for irrigation. The once-formidable Colorado is usually dry or a small stream.

We know that there could have been a viable sea-port right there because there was a viable sea-port right there.

It's not right on the beach because the Colorado had a massive Delta. The city extends right to the edge of the delta, and you (well, reasonable posters who aren't doubling down on obvious falsehoods) could well imagine how much larger that delta would have been where there was an actual river flowing, rather than just the shallow channel cut a hundred years ago and now slowly filling with silt. It quit being used as a port for Colorado to Gulf of California travel when the river dried up and the delta shrank so it's away from shore now.

 

[Skallagrim]

Quit. Lying.

1. Using superfluous punctuation makes you seem like a denizen of Tumblr, it doesn't make your words more true.

2. I refer you to the Spanish wikipedia page.


Say, what does that page -- which is much more detailed -- tell us? It tells us that there was never any major port there, preceisely because it was so impractical. The Mexicans didn't actually build a port there. The US army did, temporarily, during the tail-end of the Civil War, with Mexican permission.

Say, why did they do it then, specifically? Well, because the Port Isabel Slough only opened up in a flood in 1862. Before that, a port was in no way practical.

Say, why did that briefly-existing "Port Isabel" exist so briefly? Well, it was abandoned in 1879... a year after the rail-road opened, which I said was the more practical alternative all along.

Say, why didn't the Mexicans build a port there before, then? Because the mouth of the Colorado was a shit location for a port, and the previous (also American-established) tiny "port" (really just an offloading area on the sands) was completely impractical. And yes, required tha everything be moved into river-boats and then moved to Yuma in those, as I pointed out, and as the Spanish wiki states explicitly.


In summation:

We know that there could have been a viable sea-port right there because there was a viable sea-port right there.

There was a minor army-built dock there for all of fourteen years, thanks entirely to a major flood boring out a useful slough... and then the rail-road made it superfluous and it ceased operations.

Note that I previously wrote:

I mentioned trains because before trains, the inconvenience of "going around the peninsula" might well out-weight the trouble of having to haul a lot of shit over-land for those extra few hundred miles. But that logic no longer holds up when there's rail-roads, and the stuff is going to be put on a train wagon anyway. Doing it in San Diego makes way more sense than building a port at the mouth of the Colorado.

This is exactly what happened. You didn't agree, and argued that going around the peninsula was supposedly better than using the rail-way. But that's not true. That's not what happened. Going around was impractical for the longest time, because the Colorado wasn't as navigable as you think it was. Everything had to be moved to river-boats first, and that big delta you talked about was a shitty place for that kind of operation. Then from '62 onwards, it became more practical, and was done '65-'79... but after that, the rail-road came, and that was the end of it.

If river travel was so much more cheap and efficient, as you claim... why did the rail-road put the river barges out of business within a year, then?


Since you mention a lot of details that supposedly back your argument, I could go in to point out that the old shape of the delta is visible on the map you posted, and that it never actually reached San Luis Río Colorado. That Port Isabel, the temporary mini-port, was further South. But does this matter? I don't really think so.

The important thing here is that the rail-road easily out-competed going around the peninsula and up the river. That's what I claimed, that's what historically happened, that's what all the evidence indicates. Cherry-picking details, misrepresenting them, pretending that San Luis Río Colorado was ever a meaningful port, and incorrectly claiming that this only changed when/because California pretty much slurped the Colorado dry... that doesn't add up to a true story.


You accused me of lying. I'll be kinder, and assume you just quoted Wikipedia in good faith, wihout checking further, because it conveniently looked like it supported your established belief. But it's still not true. The train beat out the alternatives, and did it immediately.

Because trains are fucking bad-ass. But in your own words:

We probably need a picture to explain it to you.

There we go...

(The actual train that drop-kicked Port Isabel into the Gulf of California, 1879, colourised)


----------------------------------


P.S. -- Take the conclusion of this post in the light-hearted manner it is intended, okay?

 

[Bear Ribs]

1. Using superfluous punctuation makes you seem like a denizen of Tumblr, it doesn't make your words more true.

2. I refer you to the Spanish wikipedia page.

Notice the complete lack of actual references.

Say, what does that page -- which is much more detailed -- tell us? It tells us that there was never any major port there, preceisely because it was so impractical. The Mexicans didn't actually build a port there. The US army did, temporarily, during the tail-end of the Civil War, with Mexican permission.

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Port_Isabel,_Texas

Port Isabel became an important cotton-exporting port before the American Civil War. The harbor, town and lighthouse all were fought over and exchanged hands during the Civil War.

Small Town History 1302 Project: Port Isabel, Texas

pacweb.alamo.edu

Port Isabel was founded by the first documented traveler, Alonso Alvarez de Pineda.
...

In addition, in 1849, the community suffered from a major outbreak of cholera, which took several years to recover. In 1850, Point Isabel is the second largest town in the area. By 1859, the port was exporting $10 million worth of cotton annually. The Port Isabel Lighthouse was built in 1855 at a cost of $7,000, which served as a lookout during the Cortina Wars, the first three years of the Civil War, WWI, and WWII

...
Recreational opportunities included fishing, boating, and hunting. In 1989, the port handled 263,335 short tons of cargo.

Try again. Spaniards founded the port before there was even such a thing as Mexicans, and in fact over 200 years before there was such a thing as an American. Mexico built it into a major town later. It was a major cotton-exporting port long before the civil war, and it was big and important enough to have its own lighthouse. Texans took it over and it was fought over back and forth several times in the civil war due to its importance. The port is important enough to still be in use for cargo even today when the Colorado can't reach the ocean at all.

Say, why did they do it then, specifically? Well, because the Port Isabel Slough only opened up in a flood in 1862. Before that, a port was in no way practical.

Say, why did that briefly-existing "Port Isabel" exist so briefly? Well, it was abandoned in 1879... a year after the rail-road opened, which I said was the more practical alternative all along.

Say, why didn't the Mexicans build a port there before, then? Because the mouth of the Colorado was a shit location for a port, and the previous (also American-established) tiny "port" (really just an offloading area on the sands) was completely impractical. And yes, required tha everything be moved into river-boats and then moved to Yuma in those, as I pointed out, and as the Spanish wiki states explicitly.

The first European to set foot in the mouth of the Colorado River was the Spanish explorer Juan Carlos Z. in 1539 and called the mouth of the river "Ancón de San Andrés". The following year the Spanish navigator Fernando de Alarcón, who had Domingo del Castillo as his pilot, sailed from the port of Acapulco on May 9, 1540, sailed through the Gulf of California and on August 26, 1540 entered the Colorado River and named the river of Our Lady of the Good Guide.

Holy crap, Juan Carlos Z. was a time traveler whose ship went from 1539 to 1862 and back to use the slough, since obviously boats couldn't go upriver before that.

The real reason for things being so "tiny" was because the California Gold Rush of '49 had drained the entire population away, the entire population of Arizona was less than 10,000 people in the 1870 census, oh, and the Cholera Epidemic that wiped the town out in 1949 probably didn't help much. The entire garrison of Fort Yuma was five guys, one of whom was a prisoner. They literally had one officer, one sergeant, and one enlisted plus a doctor.

And of course, as pointed out above, it still was a major cotton-exporting port doing 10,000,000 a year... in 1859 dollars... several years before the magic slough, despite your claim that it was "impractical" before that and despite your claim that a port wasn't built there before '62.

In summation:



There was a minor army-built dock there for all of fourteen years, thanks entirely to a major flood boring out a useful slough... and then the rail-road made it superfluous and it ceased operations.

Note that I previously wrote:

This is exactly what happened. You didn't agree, and argued that going around the peninsula was supposedly better than using the rail-way. But that's not true. That's not what happened. Going around was impractical for the longest time, because the Colorado wasn't as navigable as you think it was. Everything had to be moved to river-boats first, and that big delta you talked about was a shitty place for that kind of operation. Then from '62 onwards, it became more practical, and was done '65-'79... but after that, the rail-road came, and that was the end of it.

If river travel was so much more cheap and efficient, as you claim... why did the rail-road put the river barges out of business within a year, then?

They didn't, of course. As Spanish Wikipedia you mentioned but failed to ever quote clearly states, Riverboat travel and use of the port ended in 1909, not in '79 when the railroad started so hardly just a year. Wonder why it happened then?

The Colorado River's First Dam Transformed The Desert Southwest

The taming of the Colorado River began with the Laguna Dam, which still diverts water for Arizona farmers.

www.kpbs.org

We all know Hoover Dam, and you might know about the Imperial or other dams that manage the Colorado River. But the very first dam on the Colorado was the Laguna Dam, completed in 1909. It diverted water to farm fields in the Yuma Valley and set the table for large-scale farming in southwest Arizona.

Ah, a dam, which happens to have no locks and blocks all river travel, was built in 1909 ending riverboat use, and said dam diverted the river so that it was shortly after dried up making use of the San Luis as a port impractical.

The other issue you're running up against is political. The United States had a vested interest in using American ports, American railroads, and American shipping. Mexico was regarded as a hostile state at the time due to several recent wars. There was a strong political impetus not to allow Mexican ports to have any control over American Shipping. This meant that even if less efficient, Railroads would be given political priority. However if in this ATL Arizona has a coast, then Port Isabel and San Luis Rio Colorado would be American ports, drawing American Tariffs and Duties, and there wouldn't be a push to eliminate it as there was OTL.

Since you mention a lot of details that supposedly back your argument, I could go in to point out that the old shape of the delta is visible on the map you posted, and that it never actually reached San Luis Río Colorado. That Port Isabel, the temporary mini-port, was further South. But does this matter? I don't really think so.

The important thing here is that the rail-road easily out-competed going around the peninsula and up the river. That's what I claimed, that's what historically happened, that's what all the evidence indicates. Cherry-picking details, misrepresenting them, pretending that San Luis Río Colorado was ever a meaningful port, and incorrectly claiming that this only changed when/because California pretty much slurped the Colorado dry... that doesn't add up to a true story.

You accused me of lying. I'll be kinder, and assume you just quoted Wikipedia in good faith, wihout checking further, because it conveniently looked like it supported your established belief. But it's still not true. The train beat out the alternatives, and did it immediately.

Because trains are fucking bad-ass. But in your own words:



There we go...

(The actual train that drop-kicked Port Isabel into the Gulf of California, 1879, colourised)


----------------------------------


P.S. -- Take the conclusion of this post in the light-hearted manner it is intended, okay?