The Clifton plate. Relief from Copernicus GLO-30; rivers and lakes from USGS NHD; watersheds from the USGS Watershed Boundary Dataset; roads and city limits from Census TIGER 2024.
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6° on Nov. 13, 1916, the coldest reading for this week of the year since 1893. Next is 8° in 1955.
Clifton’s center stands about 4,720 ft above sea level. Within three miles the land runs from 4,620 ft to 5,160 ft, a difference of 540 ft: hilly country. The highest named summit within 15 miles is Chalk Mountain, about 8,040 ft, 13 miles east-northeast.
Under the town center the state geologic map shows Gravels and alluviums (gravel, unconsolidated), from the Pleistocene, less than 0.5 million years old.
The section below crosses 10 rock units mapped at the surface.
Heights every 0.1 mile from the Copernicus GLO-90 surface model; vertical exaggeration about 4×. The colored band under the surface is the rock the state geologic map shows at the surface, not a picture of what lies beneath.
Gravel, unconsolidated. Age: Pleistocene, less than 0.5 million years old. About 11 mi of the line.
Shale, sandstone. Age: Early Cretaceous to Late Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 5 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Unconsolidated. Age: Quaternary, less than 2.6 million years old. About 2 mi of the line.
Sandstone, shale, conglomerate. Age: Early Cretaceous to Late Cretaceous, 66 to 145 million years old. About 1 mi of the line.
Claystone. Age: Paleocene to Eocene, 34 to 66 million years old. About 1.0 mi of the line.
From the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation (Horton and others, 2017), the states’ geologic maps joined at a common scale. 4 smaller units along the line are not listed.
Heights from Copernicus GLO-90 (a surface model: it includes buildings and tree canopy); summits from USGS GNIS; rivers from USGS NHDPlus HR; rock from the USGS State Geologic Map Compilation.
A raindrop that lands in Clifton reaches the Gulf of California by way of the Colorado: about 1,160 river miles.
Lakes on the way: Lake Mead, Lake Powell, Lake Mohave and Lake Havasu.
Seldom reaches the sea. Dams and canals now take nearly all of the Colorado before its old delta in Mexico.
Traced down the USGS NHDPlus V2.1 river network from the Census center point of Clifton; river miles along the main stem, rounded.
Clifton has a cold semi-arid climate. Summer afternoons average 95° in July; winter nights fall to about 17° in January. A normal year brings about 18 inches of snow; with the rain, that comes to about 9 inches of water.
On November 14 Clifton normally reaches 53° and falls to 28°. The record high is 72°, in 1903; the record low 8°, in 1916. The most rain on this date, 0.53 in, fell in 1987.
Normals 1991–2020 and records since 1893 from the Grand Junction Area threaded record (Grand Junction Walker Field, 6 miles west-northwest, 100 ft higher). NOAA, through RCC-ACIS.
