The Water Works
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THE WATER WORKS.
The pump well at Ridgewood1 is now so nearly completed, that it will be ready for operation in a few days at farthest. The shears were erected on Friday, preparatory to the erection of the engines. The forcing tubes from the pump well to the Reservoir, being nearly laid, a test supply of water will be introduced into the basin with a donkey engine in about two weeks. The pumping apparatus will probably be ready about the middle of November. The laying of the distribution pipes is nearly completed, and the work on the open canal is being pushed as rapidly as possible, in order to furnish the required 10,000,000 gallons by the first or middle of November.
Curiously enough, paragraphs of the above tenor appear simultaneously in all the New York papers this morning. That the information came from head quarters, we may presume and that it was intended to influence the action of the Common Council this evening we do not doubt; but that it is correct we do not believe. We cannot conceive the possibility of any portion of the supply of water being introduced this Fall; and the motive of asserting the contrary we believe to be, that occasion may be furnished for blaming the Common Council for delaying the work, by their omission to sanction at once the increase of $135,000 demanded for the change of the canal into a conduit. We expect about the end of the year, instead of having water, to have the assertion made, that the Board, or certain members, by not voting the $135,000 have caused the delay. We therefore think it right to say now, that we do not see how the contractors can intend or expect to have the supply or any portion of it introduced this year.
The reservoir is not finished, either as to its banks or its interior. The pumping engines are not only not erected, but are not on the spot; and the large building which must be put up for their reception is not begun. Nor is the conduit finished to Baisley's Pond2; nor are the force pipes laid between the pump well and the reservoir. Indeed they are not likely to be laid for a long time, for the Contractors, we are told, have got into a lawsuit with the owners of some of the land, and the award of the Commissioners is disputed—a fact which in itself will present a pretext for delaying the introduction of water as long as the contractors can afford to stay without the balance of their money. We know it is their interest to have the water speedily introduced; but in case they find they cannot comply with the public expectation and the promises they have made, it then becomes their interest to lay the blame of the delay on other shoulders than their own. Let it be understood, therefore, that the interval which the Common Council have wisely chosen to spend in considering the demand for $135,000 more, has not been misused—that it is not to this, or any cause connected with the canal, that the delay, should there be any, will be attributable. There are enough causes this side of Baisley's Pond to account for the non-introduction of water this year. The month that the Common Council has taken to consider the contractors' proposition relative to a conduit, will not delay the first introduction of water, even if it postpone the ultimate completion of the works. The interests of the city cannot suffer, and will not suffer, by the Common Council's taking time to examine thoroughly the relative cost of conduit and canal. Their passing on the matter hastily would have cost the city $135,000, but could not have accelerated by an hour the introduction of the first instalment of water supply.
One word more. It is too much the fashion with those interested in this water business to denounce as an enemy to the city's true interests, every writer or speaker who will not admit without question the perfect disinterestedness of the Contractors and the infallibility of the Commissioners. We think the Contractors have thus far executed the work with signal ability, and that the Commissioners are intelligent and faithful beyond all cavil; but we claim the privilege of forming an opinion for ourselves as to whether it is the city's interest to accede blindfold to everything that the Contractors may ask, or the Commissioners assent to.
Notes:
1. Cloacæ is Latin for sewer, and in this particular usage, refers to the main Roman sewer system. Whitman had a known interest in the engineering marvels of Rome, and explicitly connected Brooklyn’s proposed water system to that of the great empire on several occasions. He underlines a section on Roman city sewers and the Cloacæ on his annotated copy of an article on "Early Roman History" from the period. [back]
2. Baisley's Pond was a major supply reservoir for the Brooklyn Water Works located in what is today the borough of Queens. It was a former mill pond, named after its owner David Baisley, who had sold it to the local water authorities in 1852. It was also occasionally referred to as Baisley's Pond, Jamaica Pond, or Rider's Pond. For a period in 1857, it housed a team of engineers, including Walt's brother Thomas Jefferson Whitman ("Jeff"). [back]