Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant
Waterfall in Japanese Garden, originally uploaded by lavocado@sbcglobal.net.
A lot of the water in the L.A. River doesn't come from rain or melting snow, but from the Donald C. Tillman Water Reclamation Plant. The water from the treatment plant is cleaner than the water from storm runoff and has benefited the wildlife along the river. The reclaimed water is used in this Japanese Garden next to the plant, as well as the Wildlife Lake and Lake Balboa. It was built in 1984 and has been in continuous operation since 1985. The Japanese Garden was built to showcase the use of reclaimed water, at a time when this was a much newer idea than it is now.
Someone's website said the two most important things to see in Los Angeles are the world-famous Watts Towers and The Japanese Garden. I don't know that I would rank The Japanese Garden ranks with Watts Towers, but it's pretty interesting.
It portrays a very manicured and stylized version of nature:
I was very surprised to find lotus blossoms in late February:
This wonderful small tree, which I think is some kind of magnolia, was also in bloom:
There's an Observation Tower overlooking the reclamation plant:
Apparently you can watch a video of the process in that monitor, but I couldn't figure out how to make it work. I took this picture from the tower.
And here's one more picture of water:
