1992 Map of Wister

About this map

The Salton Sea shoreline and its surrounding desert irrigation network define this 1990s revision of Imperial County. The landscape is a stark study in resource management, dominated by the Imperial State Wildlife Area (Wister Unit) and an intricate system of water distribution including the Coachella Canal and East Highline Canal. These waterways feed a series of numbered laterals, from Niland Lateral 5 down to Niland Lateral U, which sustain the agricultural grid adjacent to the arid East Mesa. To the northeast, the terrain shifts abruptly as it enters the Chocolate Mountain Aerial Gunnery Range, a vast military reservation marked by a distinct Military Reservation Boundary. Small settlements like Wister and Iris appear as quiet outposts along the rail and road corridors, while a lone Quarry suggests the localized extraction of materials in this corner of the Colorado Desert.