Toronto Lake Water Level
Kansas · Verdigris River
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Water level history
About Toronto Lake
Toronto Lake is a reservoir on the Verdigris River in Kansas, operated by U.S. Army Corps of Engineers. Its full summer pool sits at 901.5 ft above sea level. Live water levels come from the U.S. Army Corps of Engineers (CWMS) and update hourly.
Understanding Toronto Lake's water level
Toronto Lake has a structural quirk that explains a great deal about it: the spillway crest sits at 906 feet, four and a half feet above the 901.5-foot conservation pool. The whole conservation pool lies below the gates. Above it are eight tainter gates, each forty feet wide and twenty-five feet high, and a flood pool reaching 931 feet with induced surcharge to 936, which on a 730-square-mile watershed gives the lake an enormous working range for its modest size.
The Corps operates Toronto with Fall River, Elk City and Big Hill to protect the Verdigris down to the upper limits of Oologah, releasing from whichever lake has the least flood storage left. Its own constraint has tightened over time: non-damaging channel capacity immediately below the dam has fallen from 7,000 to 6,500 cubic feet per second since the lake opened, and downstream the controlling gauges are Coyville, Altoona, Independence and Lenapah. In May 2019 the lake reached 934.44 feet, into the surcharge pool and a foot above the previous record of 933.40 set in November 1998. In October 2023 drought took it to 898.75, below conservation pool and only a few feet above the inactive pool.
The defining long-term story here is sediment, and the Corps says so plainly: the reserve built to hold fifty years of it is full, and sediment is now encroaching into the conservation pool itself, at an average of 471 acre-feet a year. Surveys between 1960 and 2010 show the conservation pool falling from roughly 2,880 acres to about 2,220, with capacity down on the order of forty percent. Kansas agencies group Toronto with the state's worst-affected reservoirs. Above the waterline, Cross Timbers State Park protects something older than any of it: a stand of ancient post oaks, twenty-six of which were dated by tree-ring researchers in 1982, with the oldest going back to about 1730.
Toronto Lake — frequently asked
What is Toronto Lake's full pool elevation?
The top of the conservation pool is 901.5 feet above sea level. The top of the flood-control pool is 931 feet, induced surcharge reaches 936, and the top of the dam is 946. Unusually, the spillway crest at 906 feet sits above the conservation pool, so the entire conservation pool lies below the spillway gates.
What are Toronto Lake's record high and low levels?
The record high is 934.44 feet on 25 May 2019, more than three feet above the top of the flood-control pool and into the induced surcharge pool. That broke the previous record of 933.40 feet set on 2 November 1998. The lowest reading in the modern record is 898.75 feet on 23 October 2023, below conservation pool.
Why is Toronto Lake so shallow?
Sediment. The Corps states that the reserve designed to hold fifty years of sediment has filled as expected and that sediment is now encroaching into the conservation pool, at an average rate of 471 acre-feet a year. Surveys from 1960 to 2010 show the conservation pool shrinking from roughly 2,880 acres to about 2,220, with capacity loss on the order of forty percent. Kansas agencies group it with the state's most sediment-affected reservoirs.
Why does Toronto Lake hold water so long after a storm?
Non-damaging channel capacity below the dam is only 6,500 cubic feet per second, and it has actually decreased from 7,000 since the lake began operating. Toronto is also regulated with Fall River, Elk City and Big Hill as a system protecting the Verdigris down to Oologah, releasing from whichever lake has the least flood storage remaining, so it waits on the whole basin.
Does Toronto Lake supply drinking water?
Barely. The town of Toronto holds 400 acre-feet of water supply storage, yielding about a tenth of a million gallons a day. Nearly all of the conservation pool is water-quality storage instead, used to hold minimum flows and downstream target flows on the Verdigris. Do not think of Toronto as a municipal supply reservoir the way Cheney or Clinton are.
What are the ancient trees at Toronto Lake?
Cross Timbers State Park on the lake protects a stand of old-growth post oak. Tree-ring researchers from the University of Arkansas dated twenty-six of them in 1982, and the one-mile Ancient Trees Trail was built to showcase fourteen, with markers giving each tree's age against events happening when it was a seedling. The oldest date to around 1730.
Other lakes near Toronto Lake
- Wilson LakeKS
- Melvern LakeKS
- Big Hill LakeKS
- Marion ReservoirKS
- Cheney ReservoirKS
- John Redmond ReservoirKS
See current levels for all 12 Kansas lakes and reservoirs →
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