Documentary History of American Water-works

Aqueducts

Notable Long Aqueducts Used in American Waterworks

This is a list of some notable longer aqueducts built in America for water supply:

Year	City	State	Length (Miles)	MGD	Owner	Material	Source	Comments
1754	Northampton	MA	2		Charles Goodrich	Bored wood logs	Springs	Unsuccessful either to bad construction or broken up by neighbor
1786	Hudson	NY	2		Consumers	Bored wood logs	Springs
1798	Albany	NY	5		Benjamin Prescott	Bored wood logs	Springs at Five Mile House	Unsuccessful, replaced by aqueduct from Mazelant Kill
1798	Boston	MA	5		Aqueduct Corporation	Bored wood logs	Jamaica Pond	One mile replaced by iron pipe in 1822, all replaced with iron in 1840.
1800	Albany	NY	3.5		Albany Water Works Co.	Bored wood logs	Mazelant Kill	Replaced with cast iron in 1813
1801	Philadelphia	PA	0.83		City of Philadelphia	Bricks	Schuylkill River	4,400 feet long, 6 foot diameter, also functioned as a reservoir holding about 900,000 gallons
1842	New York City	NY	40½	72	City of New York	Masonry	Croton Reservoir	7 ft. 5 in. wide and 8 ft. 6 in. high, ultimately delivered 95 MGD
1848	Boston	MA	14.5	7.5	City of Boston	Brick	Lake Cochituate	5 ft. wide, 6 ft. 4 in. high, able to deliver 10 MGD
1859	Brooklyn	NY	12.39	47	City of Brooklyn	Brick	Hempstead Pond	10 ft. wide, 9 ft. 8 in. high
1859	Washington	DC	11	68	Corps of Engineers	Masonry	Potomac Great Falls	9 ft. diameter, Capacity increased to 100 MGD in the 1930s
1862	Baltimore	MD	3.6	20	City of Baltimore	Brick	Lake Swann	24.75 sq ft
1870	Rochester	NY	17	3.5	Rochester Water Works Co.	Wood staves	Smithton Creek	24 inch conduit, completed September 27, 1870, but never operated.
1873	Virginia City	NV	8	2.3	Virginia and Gold Hill Water Company	Riveted wrought iron pipe		Very high water pressure 750 psig
1876	Rochester	NY	30	7	City of Rochester	Wrought Iron	Honeoye Lake
1878	Boston	MA	15	110	City of Boston			Sudbury Aqueduct
1879	Williamsport	PA	100		Tide-Water Pipe Line Company.			First long distance oil pipelin;, used Holly triplex pumps that were adapted from water works designs.
1881	Tombstone	AZ	27			Wrought iron	Springs	Still in use
1890	New York City	NY	33	300	City of New York			Second Croton Aqueduct
1892	Denver	CO	17	35	Denver Union Water Company	Wood Stave	Platte River	48-inch diameter
1893	Chicago	IL	100		Waukesha Hygeia Mineral Water Company	6-inch cast iron	Hygeia Springs	Supplied drinking water to the World's Columbian Exhibition in Chicago.
1913	Los Angeles	CA	233	313	City of Los Angeles	Various	Owens Valley	Second aqueduct opened in 1970.
1917	New York City	NY	163	880	City of New York			Catskill Aqueduct
1926	Washington	DC	11	120	Corps of Engineers			Runs parallel to 1859 aqueduct
1934	San Francisco	CA	167	400	City of San Francisco			Hetch Hetchy Reservoir

References
1880 "Aqueduct," from Appletons' Cyclopedia of Applied Mechanics, 1:83-92, edited by Page Benjamin

1886 "Aqueduct," from Johnson's Universal Cyclopaedia 1:181-184

1888 "A Big Water Project," Democrat and Chronicle (Rochester, New York), November 24, 1888, Page 1.
Cleveland, Nov. 23. - A project is on foot among capitalists here to supply the cities and towns of Ohio with water from Lake Erie. They think a large pipe line 230 miles long can be operated as successfully as tbe small pipe 600 miles long, which carries oil to Chicago. It is designed to run the water pipe line direct to Columbus and thence to Cincinnati. Reservoirs are to be constructed for securing an uninterrupted flow in case of accident. The main line would be tapped to supply smaller cities.

1889 "The Water from Bladensburg," Evening Star (Washington, DC), February 8, 1889, Page 1.
Senator Gorman to-day introduced a joint resolution to enable the United States to accept from James Crutchett a present of the springs of spa water at Bladensburg, Md. The resolution contains an appropriation of $35,000 to bring the water to Washington in iron pipes.

1889 The Boston Globe, August 2, 1889, Page 8.
One of the Saratoga newspapers, "The Union," states that it is proposed to lay a pipe line from Saratoga Springs to New York for the transportation of water of one of the springs to Troy, Albany, Poughkeepsie, New York, and Brooklyn.

1889 Boston Herald, August 3, 1889, Page 4.
A pipe line to convey spa water from Saratoga to New York City in the latest project. This ought to save the expense of going to Saratoga, anyhow.

1889 "Milk By Pipe Line," The New York Sun, December 22, 1889, Page 24.

1890 "A Milk Pipe Line," The News (Frederick, Maryland), March 19, 1890, Page 1.