Hidden Lakes & Hard Lessons: How Early Waterways Shaped Granger & Hunter
The Lakes Beneath Our Feet: A Forgotten Water Story, 1898
Long before subdivisions and highways crisscrossed the west side, the area around Hunter, Granger, and Decker Lake was shaped by a network of natural lakes, marshes, sloughs, and drainage ditches — and settlers fought hard to manage that water.
In the late 1800s, Salt Lake City and Salt Lake County joined forces with local property owners near the Jordan River to build the Surplus Canal and a system of drain ditches. The goal? To catch extra water from the Jordan River during spring floods and carry it safely away from farms, fields, and new settlements on the west side.
Work on the Surplus Canal began in June 1886. This canal, plus an early drain ditch from the west, helped move water through a chain of shallow lakes that once dotted our valley floor:
Hunter Lake naturally drained into Durst Lake,
then into Silver Lake,
then into Porter Lake,
then finally into Decker Lake — one of the best known in what’s now West Valley City.
From Decker Lake, water flowed into a depression locals called the Old Reservoir, then into a nearby slough, on north into White Lake, and farther still into Smith’s Lake. These low-lying wetlands collected runoff, spring melt, and surplus irrigation water, keeping the Jordan River from flooding fields but also creating constant disputes between farmers, canal companies, and the city.
By 1898, there were legal battles over who controlled this web of canals and natural drains. Some farmers said their fields were ruined by too much water — others said their water rights were ignored altogether. Alkaline soil, old lakebeds, and rising groundwater made farming a constant struggle. Fields once covered by shallow lake water had salt crusts that killed crops. Some lands were so salty they had to be abandoned, no matter how much fresh water was poured on them.
The early Surplus Canal and drain ditches were a bold attempt to tame these soggy west-side flats — making life and farming possible where today we see neighborhoods, roads, and schools.
Today, you’d never guess that beneath the Bangerter Highway and the busy shops of West Valley City lie the old beds of Hunter Lake, Durst Lake, Silver Lake, Porter Lake, Decker Lake, White Lake, and Smith’s Lake — reminders that this land was once a vast patchwork of water and marsh that settlers worked tirelessly to drain, tame, and build upon.
