Water company

“ The city council or board of trustees shall have power to provide for a supply of water by the boring or sinking of artesian wells, or by the construction and regulation of wells, pumps, cisterns, reservoirs, or waterworks, and to borrow money therefor, and to authorize any person or private corporation to construct and maintain the same at such rates as may be fixed by ordinance, and for a period not exceeding thirty years ”

“ Rock Water-works Company, a corporation under the laws of the State of Arkansas, undertook to construct a system of water-works for the use of the city of Little Rock and the citizens of that city, under an ordinance passed by the city authorities. ”

“ The ditch company carries the water in its own canals to the lands of the farmers. When a farmer desires water so that he can irrigate his fields he notifies the company. Its employees then operate the headgates, which are located on the company's canals and which the farmers are forbidden to operate, [10] so that the appropriate quantity of water can pass out of the company's canals and off the company's land into the farmer's irrigation ditches. The responsibility of the company's employees ceases when they so release the water. ”

“ There is nothing in § 26 nor in § 1 undertaking to bind the inhabitants of the city to take water from the company. The city has not and, of course, could not undertake to make any contract upon the subject for the private supply of individuals in the city beyond securing a maximum rate of charge for water supplied. The engagement for their benefit requires the company, during the term of the franchise, to supply water at not exceeding certain maximum prices, which were fixed by the ordinance. ”

“ The irrigation company is a corporate agency of a community of farmers, and holds, controls, and administers for their mutual advantage the water rights which enable them to irrigate and cultivate their lands, all of which are naturally arid. Long prior to the driving of the tunnel, and while the lands through which it extends were public lands of the United States, the irrigation company or its stockholders appropriated all the waters of the stream for irrigation and other beneficial uses ”

“ The true distinction seems to be between cases where the dam is erected for the express or apparent purpose of obtaining a water-power to lease to private individuals, or where, in building a dam for a public improvement, a wholly unnecessary excess of water is created, and cases where the surplus is a mere incident to the public improvement, and a reasonable provision for securing an adequate supply of water at all times for such improvement. ”

“ By these contracts, made on January 2, 1909 and prior dates the Irrigation Company, understood to be the owner of the right to divert 6,000 cubic feet per second of time of water, agreed that it would furnish and deliver to the owners of such shares all of the appropriated waters to the extent of one-eightieth of a cubic foot per second of time per acre, and that water rights or shares should not be sold beyond the carrying capacity of the canal system or in excess of the waters appropriated. ”

“ The water rights are represented by shares of stock in the Big Wood River Reservoir & Canal Company, organized as an operating company by the Irrigation Company in pursuance of contracts with the state of Idaho. ”

“ Water is essential for the working of mines, and in many instances can be obtained only from great distances, by means of canals, flumes, and aqueducts, requiring for their construction enormous expenditures of money, entirely beyond the means of a single individual. ”

“ Of water of the finest kind there is indeed a plenteous supply, but unfortunately this is a monopoly in the hands of a joint-stock company, and excepting at two or three wells, all the water introduced into the town has to be specially paid for, in the form of a tax upon the rental, by those who use it. ”

“ In river basins with reasonable annual amounts of precipitation but with human demands on streams that sometimes exceed the rate at which water flows down, such reservoirs are still usually the most dependable and efficient item in the present technology of water supply. And since they generally have other purposes to which proportionate shares of construction costs are assigned in individual cases—flood protection, water quality control, navigation, hydroelectric power, recreation, silt detention, etcetera—they tend often to be the most economic sources of big quantities of water. ”

“ Certainly the scarcity of water was not an unmixed curse, for it gave employment to many who would otherwise have been hard put to it to gain a living. Dam-makers, well-sinkers, water-carters, tinsmiths, condenser-fitters, wood-cutters, employees on condensing plants, water-bag makers, caretakers at Government wells, dams, and soaks, engineers, and many more, all found employment either directly or indirectly in connection with water supply. ”

“ It has two kinds of supply—one for drinking, that of spring water, and the other for manufacturing and general use. For the latter demands, the supply is taken partly from the Neckar River, and pumped through three artificial filter beds; and partly from lakes, whose water is conducted, through cast-iron pipes 15,000 feet in length, to five filter-beds, and thence into two reservoirs, 145 feet below the lake. The reservoir, for the filtered water from the river, is three miles from the pumping station, and 180 feet elevation. Seven million gallons are used daily. ”

“ As the water brought by canal is not sufficient to irrigate the entire cane acreage, the government has allowed the factories to install a number of large pumping plants by which water is raised from rivers. In such cases, whenever the factories have pumped water enough for their own requirements, they are generally willing to operate the pump free of cost to supply water to the native farmer. ”

“ This is particularly true where families have been accustomed to utilizing municipal water supplies which are safe and pure as to quality and unlimited in amount. In most country homes it is necessary to construct a water-supply system, which means reaching a supply of underground water, pumping [Pg 56] it to the surface and piping it to locations where it is wanted. Higher standards of living create new and increased demands for water. ”

“ I had built a little cabin in Yosemite, and for convenience in getting water, and for the sake of music and society, I led a small stream from Yosemite Creek into it. Running along the side of the wall it was not in the way, and it had just fall enough to ripple and sing in low, sweet tones, making delightful company, especially at night when I was lying awake. Then a few frogs came in and made merry with the stream,—and one snake, I suppose to catch the frogs. ”

“ All corporations formed under the provisions of this act, or claiming any of the privileges of the same, shall furnish pure, fresh water to the inhabitants of such city and county, or city or town, for family uses, so long as the supply permits, at reasonable rates, and without distinction of persons, upon proper demand therefor, and shall furnish water, to the extent of their means, to such city and county, or city or town, in case of fire or other great necessity, free of charge. ”

“ The problems of proper water-supply and sewerage are still to be solved. An American syndicate are arranging to put in a good system of water-works, and until that is done little can be accomplished in the way of sewerage. ”

“ The compensation to millers by the Manchester and Liverpool Water-Works was fixed by Parliament at one third of the available rain-fall. Nearly one-half of the present capacity of the Glasgow supply is used by mill-owners.
On this subject John W. Erwin, resident engineer of the Ohio State Board of Public Works, says:
“The riparian right of water-users are great, and could not be purchased for $2,000,000. ”

“ It further requires such an understanding of the topography of the region as will enable the engineer to determine the area of the catchment basin of each stream, and to intelligently select sites for the construction of canals and storage reservoirs and to determine from what source of water supply each district may be best irrigated.
Experience and practice in various parts of the world have already proven that irrigation enterprises, undertaken on a large scale by private capital have seldom been remunerative investments, in fact, have frequently been financial failures. ”

“ There is not the slightest question in my mind but that this should be used as the source of water supply, and not only that, but that it will be used as a water supply in a very short time independently of whether this project is adopted or not. ”

“ There are thirteen storage and distributing reservoirs, with a water surface of 9751⁄2 acres, and capacity of 6,458 million gallons. The greatest depth of reservoirs is 84 feet. The conduit is 18 miles in length. The drainage area is 19,300 acres. Available daily supply is 33 million gallons, of which 13 millions are required for mill-owners. The average rain-fall is 50 inches, and mean available resource of 33 inches. The cost of the works was 4 million dollars. The population in 1874 was 750,000; daily average consumption 16 million gallons, and 550 miles of pipe. ”

“ A private corporation is paid annually about $28,500 for street lighting, and $24,000 is expended in like manner for water. The water supply is exceptionally good and is obtained from 12 artesian wells, which furnish the 110 miles of mains with 35,000,000 gallons a day. ”

“ In addition to the reservoir, pump-house, and other improvements connected with the water-supply, an extensive filter has been constructed and the pumping reservoir filled from the river. The board of visitors, in their report, in referring to these improvements, say:
The institution possesses, in duplicate, the most substantial, durable, and reliable facilities for raising to the tanks in the attics of the main edifice an ample supply of pure water, that is essential to the economies, health, and safety of every hour of hospital life. ”

“ But before they can take it they must store it up in a reservoir, or perhaps, in several reservoirs, constructed on the course of the stream one above another.
I know of one town in Yorkshire where the water supply is being secured by the formation of four such reservoirs, whence it will flow through pipes a distance of some fifteen miles. The probable cost of the work is more than a million, the probable time that it must occupy more than ten years, the probable number of men employed during that time it would be difficult to estimate ”

“ The diagram applies to ordinary areas suitable for reservoir construction and in which the minimum flow of the stream reaches about one-fifth of a cubic foot per second per 1000 acres. Correspondingly, the straight line a a represents uniformly distributed supply, also cumulatively recorded, of the same quantity of water over the same period. But, apart from the diurnal fluctuations of consumption which may be equalized by local “service reservoirs,” uniform distribution of supply throughout twelve months is rarely what we require ”

“ The minimum flow of water in the river where the dam is constructed, has been stated to be twenty-seven millions of gallons for every twenty-four hours. This would be a sufficient supply for one million of inhabitants, and should the population of the city increase to one million and a half, this supply, together with the quantity in store, will probably be sufficient during any season of drought. ”

“ In order to develop irrigation, numerous syndicates have been formed, as some of the land was held in small parcels by proprietors and farmers who had neither the funds nor the power, in opposition to intervening landowners, to obtain branches to conduct the water from the main irrigating canal to their properties. The price charged for the water is regulated by the price charged for corn on the basis of 1·66 bushel per acre irrigated. ”

“ This water would be filtered at Poughkeepsie, and we now know that all impurities can be removed.
If this scheme is carried out, the total supply will be about 1,300,000,000 gallons daily, or enough for a population of from 12,000,000 to 13,000,000 persons. By putting in more pumps, filter-beds, and conduits, this supply can be increased forty per cent., or to 1,800,000,000 gallons daily. This water would fill every day a lake one mile square by ten feet deep. This is a fair example of the scale of the engineering works of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. ”

“ Experiments by Wm. McAlpine, for Albany water-works, shows that from a water-shed of 2,600 acres, 411⁄2 per cent. of the rain-fall was carried off by the streams from May till October, inclusive, while from November till April, 77.6 per cent. was so carried off.”
In England the allowance for absorption and evaporation ranges from nine to nineteen inches per annum. In this country it is from 75 to 100 per cent. greater.
We produce from “Fanning’s Water Supply” the following table of experiments on evaporation from surfaces of shallow tanks ”

“ This done, the use of the water and of the reservoir sites might be granted to the respective States or Territories or to individuals or associations upon the condition that the necessary works should be constructed and the water furnished at fair rates without discrimination, the rates to be subject to supervision by the legislatures or by boards of water commissioners duly constituted. The essential thing to be secured is the common and equal use at fair rates of the accumulated water supply. ”