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Show Chapter 9 Comprehensive Development At the outset, "comprehensive development" must be given a fixed meaning. For the term has been so employed, both in statutes and by agencies administering them, as to connote a variety of definitions. Sometimes it is used seemingly to denote a plan of development of a single river for a particular purpose, such as a "comprehensive" flood-control plan. Or at other times, a like basin-wide plan. It has also been used to describe a composite plan related predominantly to the specialized ac- tivities of two or more agencies, such as the Army Engineers and the Bureau of Reclamation. Thus, inclusion of a provi- sion that projects be consistent with the "comprehensive de- velopment" of a river sometimes leaves unclear whether the term refers to development for a specified principal purpose, such as flood control, or to over-all development to achieve maximum beneficial use for all purposes. We believe all will agree that there should be coordination of the uses of a river and of the structures in it to fulfill as many as possible of the sometimes conflicting purposes for whicji waters may be used or controlled, and that such uses should be integrated with land practices in the surrounding watershed. If this be so, comprehensive development, as ap- plied to water resources and related land uses, may be defined as basin-wide development for optimum beneficial uses of a river system and its watershed. Despite the variations in the use of the term "comprehensive development," noted above, it may fairly be said that they all move toward the definition sug- gested, as we shall see. Since that is so, we shall employ that definition, unless the context dictates otherwise, in order to avoid variables as we trace the growth of the concept. 383 911611-51------26 |