How Water Resources Were Developed for Brooklyn NY

Ridgewood Reservoir - Introduction

The grand and historic location in Highland Park, New York -- that is known as the Ridgewood Reservoir -- sits on a ridge that was formed by the second Pleistocene Period (Wisconsin's ice sheet's terminal moraine) about 12,000 years ago. The site offers scenic views of the Atlantic Ocean, and of several nearby New York cemeteries (East New York, Woodhaven, and the Rockaways). Presently it is what the New York Audubon Society calls an "accidental wilderness tucked alongside the Jackie Robinson Parkway" on the border of Queens and Brooklyn (www.nyaudubon.org).

This paper covers the beginnings of the enormous and critical water development that would provide the needs for a growing Brooklyn in the 19th century. This paper covers the legacy of that development -- including the characters that played central roles, the engineers and politicians -- with its many controversial and contentious issues and its hit and miss engineering proposals during the era in which Brooklyn was trying to arrive at a solution for its future water needs. Included in the research for this paper -- other reservoirs around the country whose usefulness as a source of water has run out, and a review of Olmstedian-style parks will also be presented.

Brief History of Water, Highland Park, and the Ridgewood Reservoir

In 1856, the city fathers in Brooklyn showed wisdom and foresight when they acquired Highland Park; albeit it was purchased in pieces over time, the acquisition of Snediker's cornfield got the ball rolling toward a future that included water for the fast-growing city. It should be noted that perhaps developing Ridgewood Reservoir wasn't so much a matter of foresight as it was pragmatism: a growing city without an adequate future source of water is like a new school building with no students or teachers. Later in this paper, the details of how the plan for developing a water source will be covered more fully, but that key reservoir was constructed two years after its purchase (1858) and began providing the citizens of Brooklyn initially with about 154 million gallons of water (nycgovparks.org).

The city did show intelligent vision in 1891 when it made a pivotal purchase of the land that surrounded the reservoir (now called Upper Highland Park); it also showed good governmental sense by handing over the legal jurisdiction of the land around Ridgewood Reservoir to The Highland Park Society. The land surrounding the reservoir served as a kind of buffer from pollution-generating garbage plants and from runoff from the care and management of the cemeteries mentioned in the opening paragraph of this paper. The reservoir got a bit more sophistication in 1894 when the landscape architecture firm of Olmsted, Olmsted and Eliot designed the main road around the reservoir and the south concourse (nycgoparks.org).

A year later, in 1895, an iron fence was built surrounding the reservoir and was classed up a lot by the installation of electric lights. More parcels were added to the park that served as the source of drinking water (and other water uses) in 1905; the land that today is called Lower Highland Park resulted from purchases of the Monford and Schenck estates. And a year later the land transfer between The Highland Park Society and the New York Department of Water, Sewer, Gas and Electric resulted in still more property for the Ridgewood Reservoir.

But the important point, the vital part of the Ridgewood Reservoir for Brooklyn, was the plentiful supply of water it provided. In fact the reservoir served Brooklyn with water from 1858 to 1959. More water came available for the City of New York (including Brooklyn and Queens) in 1917 when a colossal water project was created upstate. Tunnel #1 was bored through the hilly terrain from the Catskill Mountains; and in 1936, Tunnel #2 was completed, bringing needed water to the megalopolis that is New York City (nycgoparks.org).

Those developments led to the draining of Basin One and Basin Three in the Ridgewood Reservoir, and only Basin Two remained in the Ridgewood Reservoir; and it supplied a backup source of water for Brooklyn and Queens. By 1990, so much water was available to Brooklyn (and Queens) from the Catskill aqueduct project it was deemed unnecessary to continue to harvest water from the Ridgewood Reservoir, hence, it was "decommissioned"; and in 2004, the Mayor of New York, Michael Bloomberg, decided to have the reservoir transferred to the Parks Department, and pushed the idea of developing the reservoir spaces into a public park with ball fields and other facilities.

Bloomberg's proposal met immediate resistance (which continues today) from organizations that see the value in providing open space, wetlands, habitat for natural world species (trees, plants) and of course wildlife, especially birds. More will be presented on this controversy later in the paper.

How Brooklyn Tapped into Ridgewood Reservoir for its Water Source

James Pugh Kirkwood wrote an exhaustively detailed book on how Brooklyn went about finding and securing a good source of water for their rapidly expanding population. His book, Brooklyn Water Works and Sewers: A Descriptive Memoir was published in 1867 and clearly provides a solid background into how the source of water was located. The read is not at all a smooth-flowing narrative -- no one expects the quality of a Hemingway or Capote when it comes to historical records -- nor is it elegant in its tone. But it is some of the best available background for this paper.

Kirkwood notes that the Romans used pragmatic vision when they constructed the " ... largest known aqueducts until modern times," a total of nineteen aqueducts. They were designed using gravity-power from many streams in higher locations than Rome. The author reports that the Roman aqueducts were built by " ... citizens anxious to win popularity from the government and their peers."

The founding fathers and other leaders living in Brooklyn in 1834 certainly were anxious to become appreciated -- if not also popular -- by locating and devising dependable sources of water. The village of Brooklyn was incorporated as a city in 1834, with a population of about 23,000, Kirkwood points out. The very first stab at coming up with a long-term water solution was made by a committee led by Gabriel Furman and James Walters, who reported to the city (on March 24, 1834) that "... wells should be sunk at the base of the hill on which Fort Green (which was Washington Park) was situated" (Kirkwood, x). Water would be pumped by steam pumps to a reservoir on the hill, they suggested, using eleven miles of ten and four inch pipe; and the entire project was estimated to cost $100,000. Their report gathered dust as no city official was willing to act on it. It was eighth ahead of its time or a bad idea in its time.

Plan after Plan was Summarily Rejected in Fits and Starts

In 1847 Brooklyn had grown to three times what it was in 1843, and another committed was formed (D.A. Bokee, John Stansbury, and J.W. Cochran) in the hopes of developing a sustainable supply of water for the borough. Again a steam-powered pump situation was projected (sucking water out of wells and sending up to a reservoir). No surveys were taken and no estimates offered; and again, the proposal went nowhere.

In 1849, once again a committee was appointed (there were more names than is needed for this report), and it was deja vu all over again (to reference famed Yankee Yogi Berra) as this group did not succeed in finding lightning in a bottle -- i.e., their plan was not given serious consideration. At least this latest stab at a plan included a chemical analysis, Kirkwood reported (xi).

Yet again in 1852, a report was ordered and a survey was conducted. By now Brooklyn was growing very rapidly and desperately needed a plan for future water. The Water Committee of 1852 (including a man named "Montgomery Queen" and four others) came up with plan that would cost an estimated seven million eight hundred thousand dollars. Each resident of Brooklyn would be entitled to thirty gallons daily.

Not surprisingly, the city couldn't wrap its arms around that 1852 idea and so a new Water Committee was appointed in 1854 (including a man named Samuel Booth, apparently no relation to Lincoln's assassin; four others joined Booth on the committee). The four and a half million dollar proposal from this latest committee was submitted to the voters. The math did not work out well for this committee's efforts: of the 9,105 votes cast, 6,402 were "no" votes. However, by early 1857, a new and more acceptable solution to Brooklyn's water needs got the stamp of approval from the voters and the city fathers. Hence, the Ridgewood Reservoir came to be the answer that had been sought for years; the "Board of Water Commissioners of the City of Brooklyn" was signed into law on July 9, 1857 (Kirkwood, xxii).

A year earlier, on July 31, 1856, the former ground-breaking ceremony took place at the Ridgewood Reservoir, and Brooklyn made a big deal out of it, which of course it was a very big deal at that time. Indeed, the Common Council of Brooklyn arranged for " ... 30 horse-drawn stage coaches to leave Brooklyn City Hall ... to journey to the reservoir site" (Save Ridgewood Reservoir, 2015) (http://ridgewoodreservoir.blogspot.com). And The Launch of the Ridgewood Reservoir

The Ridgewood Reservoir occupied 48.4 acres of land (including 25.58 acres of water) and no trees were originally allowed because leaves from the trees would be "blown into the water," and might "clog the gates and screens of the outlet-chamber" (Kirkwood, p. 4). Once the water began to flow into the reservoir, in November, 1858, it was the beginning of the end of the frantic, and futile, search for a solution for Brooklyn's ultimate source of water.

According to Tom Dowling, writing in a site called New York City H2O (nych2o.org), there were more than 15 reservoirs and more than twenty "driven wells" and streams that ran through Massapequa in Nassau County on Long Island. The water from these sources flowed via brick conduit to the Ridgewood Reservoir. Gravity allowed water from Hempstead Pond to the pump station at the Ridgewood Reservoir. There were originally two basins but a third was included in 1863, which expanded the capacity to 150 million gallons. At the bottom on the reservoir -- which was very thick, sticky clay -- stones were placed on top of the clay.

Baisley Pond (known also as Jamaica Pond) became a reservoir in 1852, but only after dredging uncovered parts of a mastodon skeleton provided a history lesson for all those involved (and the public). There is a report that the Brooklyn Historical Society has a tooth from that mastodon, but a quick search of the BHS site did not turn up any such tooth. It has been mentioned that Brooklyn was growing very quickly; Dowling writes that Brooklyn grew from 150,000 in 1850 to 180,000 in 1860 -- and again to 600,000 in 1880 and by 1894 Brooklyn was a city of a million citizens (p. 2).

Water Hook-up Rates were Dirt Cheap in 1859

The New York Times reported on May 30, 1859, that "... every plumber in the city is so busy that but few can fill an order for water in less than three weeks." And once the family plumber hooks up water from the Ridgewood Reservoir, the cost of water (paid annually on May 1). The rate for a hookup that is less than 16 feet from the pipe was $4.00; for a hook-up that was between 37-1/2 and 50 feet was $14.00 (nytimes.com).

Brooklyn's Water Limitations -- New York Aqueducts to the Rescue

In time, the folks in Brooklyn demanded indoor plumbing, so more water was needed for that; and industry (including breweries in Brooklyn) needed more and more water. Because of this over pumping, wells were drawn down dangerously low and ocean water began to leak into fresh water wells, which caused the water to be brackish (Dowling, p. 2). What was the solution? The city turned to its godfather, New York City in 1898, and so NYC consolidated with Brooklyn to take the pressure off the Ridgewood Reservoir (albeit the reservoir did continue to provide some water for Brooklyn until late in the 20th century).

Troubles and Issues along the Way -- Water Purity

An article in The New York Times on June 15, 1862 discusses how blase and cavalier Brooklyn residents apparently were as to the purity of their water from the Ridgewood Reservoir. Nothing causes so little thought as "the water we drink" (nytimes.com). Whether or not the water from the Ridgewood Reservoir was actually safe to drink appeared to cause " ... little disturbances among the great water-consuming community," but, the article points out, great attention was said to have been paid to water purity (nytimes.com). So typhoid, cholera, and diseases of the bowels should not be a concern to citizens in Brooklyn, the Times' article points out with an occasional use of irony and cryptic language.

Prior to 1868, the most recent chemical analysis done on the Ridgewood Reservoir was completed in 1860, the article continues. The rain falls on Long Island and makes its way through rivulets and streams into the springs that ultimately flow into the Ridgewood Reservoir. It is this fact that disturbed the writer of this writer in the Times in 1868; the water flows through villages and cemeteries, picking up impurities that Brooklyn citizens will be consuming. "It is a sanitary necessity" to be certain of the safety of the water, the writer emphasizes; however, with water prices at 2-1/2 cents per 1,000 gallons in 1868, many citizens gave little thought to the possibility of disease or other toxins in the water.

Samples of the water were to have been taken and chemically analyzed earlier than 1868, but apparently officials wanted to be absolutely sure all the machinery and technology was firmly in place. This was an anathema to what should have happened vis-a-vis testing water, the Times explained. "This analysis should have been made (in 1867) by Professor Chandler but the multiplicity of duties thrust upon him from various quarters prevented the testing of Ridgewood Reservoir" (nytimes.com). The article includes a table with test results from a number of cities, including London, Amsterdam, Philadelphia, Chicago and other places. The amount of inorganic materials (per 100,000 parts of water) in London was 30.26; in Amsterdam it was 118.10. The writer was suggesting (without data) that Ridgewood Reservoir would be much worse, albeit that was just newspaper speculation.

Troubles and Issues long the Way -- Work Stoppage

In June, 1878, the employees at the Ridgewood Reservoir engine house walked off the job when the city fired Fredrick B. Hart, the lead engineer (nytimes.com, 1878). The workers had threatened to walk, and they did. The engineer hired to replace Hart, Edward Fry, got zero assistance from a recalcitrant, angry Hart in terms sharing some of the particulars of the job with the incoming head engineer (nytimes.com).

Troubles and Issues along the Way -- Political Carnage

In December, 1892, the Brooklyn Works Commissioner Adams told the Board of Alderman that the pumping engines were worn out and should be replaced (to the tune of $510,000) (nytimes.com, 1892). After all, these pumps had to produce constant power to lift water over 170 feet to the Ridgewood Reservoir. The Aldermen just ignored Adams and adjourned for the summer. The Aldermen said the Mayor (Boody) and Adams secretly wanted to award a generous contract friends but no replacements were needed. Even when Boody called a special session to confront the problem of aging pumps, the Aldermen " ... simply stayed away and ignored him" (nytimes.com). Indeed, pump number 3 did break down soon after this political hassle, and residents were urged to be very economical in their use of water (nytimes.com).

Troubles and Issues along the Way -- Brown Water

As the years went by, water purity continued to be a problem for the Brooklyn officials. On September 5, 1896, the Brooklyn Daily Eagle (BDE) reported that Mayor Wurster had authorized $3,000 for the Health Commissioner to hire " ... experts, who will make a careful analysis of the water at different wells and reservoirs." The chief engineer, De Verona, conducted an investigation to determine what was causing some of the water coming out of faucets in Brooklyn to be brown. De Verona rationalized that "... isolated cases may be found where a chemical examination would show trouble with the water," but he assured citizens that it would " ... not affect the whole unless the trouble was general" (BDE).

De Verona went on to gush, "The result of the physical examination ... at Ridgewood could not be more satisfactory. The water was perfectly odorless, colorless, and tasteless. It was cool ... an ideally superior quality," and he asserted that the problem couldn't be at the reservoir. But where could it have originated from? The engineer admitted that pipes had "impurities," and the Water Commissioner Willis ordered the pipes " ... flushed in order to remove the cause of the impure water" (BDE).

Troubles and Issues along the Way -- Waste of Water

In the same February, 1899 issue of the Brooklyn Daily Eagle, a report scolded the citizens for indulging in " ... profuse use of water, or waste, in hot summer days, to keep cool, and in midwinter to prevent freezing in their pipes." However, in the next sentence, the Eagle pointed out that the waste is " ... much smaller than in the boroughs of Manhattan and the Bronx." The rationale used in this article obviously shows home-town bias, and even further, the article points out that if Brooklyn had the same amount of supplies that Manhattan had access to, " ... the people would probably fall into the same habits of waste," an assumption which seems a bit absurd. After all, it's up to city leaders to educate citizens about proper water usage. The writer does point out that in the hottest months of the year, Brooklyn used 7,000,000 more gallons than in mild temperatures (or 7.70% more); quickly the writer compares that with Manhattan, which uses 28,000,000 more gallons daily in hot weather (11.4% more than in mile weather) (BDE).

Ridgewood Reservoir Today

Because the reservoir was decommissioned in 1990, and has not provided meaningful supplies of water to Brooklyn for many years, some say this bucolic and pastoral piece of property should remain as the wilderness that it has become. Professor Munshi-South of the City University of New York reports that the area around the reservoir is home to " ... tens of thousands of different species," including " ... an astonishing 137 kinds of birds" (including eight rare species) (Munshi-South, 2008). When Heidi Steiner with the Brooklyn Bird Club visited the reservoir in 2007, with 15 other environmental activists, they were shocked to count 101 different species of birds in less than 30 hours of counting. There are many migratory birds and some breeding species (like the Warbling Vireos, Yellow Warblers, and Black-capped Chickadees and Baltimore Orioles), and a myriad of other kinds of birds. The Brooklyn Botanic Garden's curator, Uli Lorimer, researched the Ridgewood Reservoir area and reported that the reservoir is undergoing " ... forest succession in an urban environment" (Munshi-South, p. 3).

She reports that the forest succession (the process whereby land once cleared by humans is by nature returning to its natural forest state) is well underway at the reservoir. The trees that are thriving (Red Maple, Grey Birch, Pin Oak, Sweetgum, Willows and Popular, among many others) are impressive, and many other species of plants are thick and healthy (Munshi-South, p. 4). The downside of the growth at the reservoir is the many invasive species have begun to crawl into the fences that guard the reservoir.

City of New York Plans -- A Park and Athletic Fields

In 2007, the City came out with a plan to create ball fields (a $50 million plan), that would have cleared about 20 acres of the reservoir, but that plan died for lack of cash, according to the New York Daily News (Colangelo, 2013). Other plans the city had put forward -- a park with natural turf fields, paths and viewing platforms for bird and wildlife watching -- have apparently died due to a lack of money (Colangelo, p. 2).

The reservoir is " ... a teeming wildlife preserve in New York City," according to an editorial in The New York Times by William C. Thompson Jr., and Robert F. Kennedy Jr. There is " ... an amazing range of plant and animal species" that thrive in the reservoir, and the 50 acre site features " ... tens of thousands of plants and trees" that have taken root and flourished (Thompson, et al., 2008).

There are songbirds, turtles, fish, frogs and insects, and yet, the authors explain, New York City's Parks Department hopes to create a "renovation" project, which "flies in the face" of former mayor Michael Bloomberg's "environmental blueprint" (Thompson, p.2). Bloomberg had talked often about the sad loss of natural areas around New York, and his own parks commissioner has called the defunct reservoir a "highly significant" place for the "biodiversity of New York City and the region" (Thompson, p. 2).

The environmental activist group, Riverkeeper, opposed the city's development plans for a number of reasons. For one, the storm water that would " ... otherwise enter the city's already over-burdened sewer system" would be absorbed -- like a massive natural sponge -- by the Ridgewood Reservoir. Still on the subject of preventing water-related disasters, Riverkeeper notes that when you replace woodlands with recreational fields, that raises the possibility of "exacerbating flooding" and it has the "urban heat island effect." The most obvious objection launched by Riverkeeper is why mindlessly destroy "important habitat for many bird and plan species"?

Other Reservoirs that have been Returned to Nature

In the United Kingdom, the Lakeland Reservoir served drinking water functions to Glennridding, England, for nearly one hundred years. But because it hasn't provided water to the public for ten years -- and there are other water sources in the region -- officials decided to allow it to return to nature. Part of the project includes removing the 106-year-old concrete and stone Hayeswater's dam and restoring that terrain as a "mountain tarn" (The Westmorland Gazette, 2014). Removal of the dam allows the original river's natural flow to continue, and a scenic footbridge will be built over the river for hikers and other nature enthusiasts. Moreover, removing the dam allows " ... wildlife like eels to migrate in and out of the restored tarn," the Gazette's writer explains.