CLASSIFICATION IN KELATION TO WATEB EESOUECES. 167 



(d) Township cards showing the extent and date of withdrawals and restora- 

 tions, filed by States and arranged by principal meridian, range, and township. 



(e) Mounted State map on ^hlch withdrawals and restorations are platted. 

 (/) Withdrawal ledger in which is kept a chronologic record of withdrawals 



and restorations showing the number, area, date of recommendation, and date 

 of approval. 



METHODS OF FIELD EXAMINATION. 

 urvBKsrT'Z' op oonditioits. 



The examination of lands and conditions along any stream for the 

 purpose of locating a feasible power site is a fairly common and 

 well-defined engineering operation. The examination of lands and 

 conditions for the purpose of classifying the lands according to 

 " power value," as the expression is interpreted in this bulletin, is 

 quite another matter. In the first case, the effort is made to locate 

 one or more sites that appear best adapted for development under 

 the prescribed conditions of cost and prospective market which 

 prevail at that particular time. The study is concentrated on the 

 lands that will be involved in that particular development. In the 

 second case, all the lands in public ownership adjoining or near the 

 stream are presented for consideration, and the problem is to deter- 

 mine whether any or all of these lands could be used in the develop- 

 ment of any feasible power site. Moreover, the feasibility can not 

 be settled on the basis of present limitations of development but 

 must be determined according to what are believed to be the limi- 

 tations of a future day, when water power will be a more vital factor 

 in our economy than it is now and when, by reason of increased 

 demand, a development whose unit cost would now be too great 

 would become thoroughly practicable. Power sites are classified 

 according to their future possible utility as well as according to 

 their present value. 



There are other features which still further broaden the scope of 

 an investigation of the kind here described. It is necessary to de- 

 termine whether the lands examined may not be more beneficially 

 devoted to the use of water for domestic supply or for irrigation 

 than for power, and whether their use for power may not be preju- 

 dicial to the other uses at the site in question or at some other site 

 more or less remote. 



It must also be determined in many cases whether the land itself, 

 irrespective of any distant lands which may be served, is of more 

 value for agriculture or as a town or manufacturing site than as a 

 power site. Such a consideration applies especially to lands that 

 may be suitable for storage reservoirs. Usually the civic, industrial, 

 or rural improvements that have previously been made in a reservoir 

 site largely control the decision on this point, but the cases in which 

 such influences are absent are still relatively frequent. Therefore 



