THE VALUE OF WATER-RIGHTS
over ordinary values, i.c., over the value of grazing and farm
lands crossed by the railroads and canals. In the case of railroads
 the excess is generally so per cent to 200 per cent. This
would probably also be a fair assumption in the case of canal
rights of way. In the case of reservoirs the value of the reservoir
 site as compared with that of other land of similar location
and quality may go to much higher limits, but not enough data
are at hand to justify an attempt to give reliable averages.
Where the site is large and the use one that may not prove highly
remunerative, due to remoteness of location, high cost of construction,
 scant rainfall on the watershed or other modifying
causes, such as the availability of alternative reservoir sites,
a bare allowance to the owner for forced abandonment of his
holdings may represent the limit of what any prudent purchaser
would pay. In other cases a multiple of 5 or even more may not
be unreasonable.
When there is also a strategic value due to relatively large
earnings that will result, perhaps, from rates that have been or
that must be so fixed that they will yield a fair return on some
other less favorably situated property, then there will be an
excess of value determinable from the large present or prospective
 earnings, and a part of this excess would naturally be
allotted to the person who owns the reservoir site, the rest
thereof going to the party who actually makes the water development.

Certain Increments of Reservoir Land Value. — It is generally
 recognized that the problem of valuing reservoir lands is
one of the most difficult that can be presented to the engineer.
None of the facts relating to the availability of a reservoir site
taken by itself determines its market value. But every such
fact must have some effect upon the minds of an intelligent
public and therefore influences the market value.
Tracts separately owned which must all be combined under
one ownership to be available for use as a reservoir will have
less value in separate ownership than after being assembled in
one holding. The value of reservoir lands will be less if there

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