The White-Yampa River Basin Tyler Patterson Abstract: The White-Yampa River Basin is located in Northwestern Colorado, Southern Wyoming, and Eastern Utah. The Yampa flows from its Rocky Mountain headwaters', through rural irrigated valleys and steep canyons, inside of Dinosaur National Monument, before rendezvousing with the Green River at Echo Park. As the Green River's largest tributary, the Yampa has a splendid canyon composed mainly of limestone and sandstone rock walls. The Monument provides protection to the river and its habitat, but that was not always the case. During the 1950's the Bureau of Reclamation proposed a dam at Echo Park, which if completed would have drown forty-six miles of the Yampa and a comparable amount of the Green River. Controversy surrounded the region for more than a decade until a compromise was reached. Echo Park and the Yampa River were saved, but Glen Canyon Dam was built without any formal opposition, destroying one of the most untouched canyons in the United States Key References: Harvey, Mark W. T. (1994). A Symbol of Wilderness; Echo Park and the American Conservation Movement. Albuqerque: University of New Mexico Press. Sears, Julian D. (1962). Yampa Canyon in the Unita Mountains Mountains Colorado. Washington: United States Government Printing Office. Stegner, Wallace. (1955). This Is Dinosaur; Echo Park Country and Its Magic Rivers. New York: Alred A. Knopt.   Return to Water Resources Papers page.