West Side Pumping Station, 22nd Street Pumping Station
Life Span: 1874-1960
Location: 2260 S. Ashland avenue
Architect:
West Side Water Works
Ashland and 22nd Street
Chicago Tribune, July 9, 1874
The Board of Public Works wore engaged yesterday in preparing the advertisement for the two engines to be used in the new West Side Water-Works, whose capacity is to be 15,000,000 gallons a day each. The advertisement will be published on Friday (right).
The Tunnels and Water System of Chicago Under the Lake and Under the River, J. M. Wing, 1874
The first and second lake tunnels, as described in the fore going chapters, bring the water of the lake to the shore, at the present pumping works, an illustration of which accompanies this volume. From this point the water passed by the first tunnel has been distributed over the city through a system of mains and pipes, as in other cities, the force or head being obtained from the stand pipe into which it was lifted by means of the powerful engines. But so rapidly did the city expand in every direction, that it soon became apparent that this system of street supply was becoming inadequate. In order to overcome a lack of water supply in sections of the city lying remote from the present Water Works, it was decided to excavate a tunnel under the city, until it reached a point on the South Branch near its intersection with Twenty-second street, where the city had puchased a large lot of S. J. Walker,Esq. Here the auxiliary Pumping Works are to be erected, as seen on the diagram, and from this point the great West Side will be mainly supplied with its water in the future.
This tunnel is, in effect, a monster main, extending under the entire city, of a size and capacity never before dreamed of by any municipality.
The contractors are Messrs. Cox Brothers, who, as this volume is in press, are vigorously prosecuting the work. Our illustration of the shaft at Illinois street pertains to this tunnel.
A good many incidents might be enumerated in connection with the work on this new tunnel, but the experience of the miners and contractors has been substantially that narrated in preceding chapters, as occurring in the original work.
The cost of this”bore”cannot at this time be definitely stated, but it will not fall far short of a million dollars, including the building and engines at the new works. This tunnel, it is expected, will complete, for many years at least, the water system of Chicago. To say that it will be the most unique and perfect system in the world, will be only to corroborate the opinions of all scientific men on the subject.
West Side Water Works
Ashland and 22nd Street
1878
The Land Owner, November, 1873
Our Water-Tunnels—Sectional View Showing The Entire Water System Of Chicago, From The Lake To The New Pumping Works, Corner Of Twenty-Second Street And Blue Island Avenue.
Chicago Tribune, August 1, 1875
THE NEW LAKE TUNNEL
The second lake tunnel han boen satisfsctorily completed. On the 7th of last July, a party of city officials, prominent residents, and visitors from abroad, were afforded, through the courtesy of the contractors, Messrs. Steele & McMahon, the novel pleasure of a trip through the tunnel to the crib. The land tunnel connecting the new lake tunnel with the West Side water-works has also been completed, and the water has been already turned in, so as to make it available for use in case of fire. The capacity of the new lake tunnel is 100,000,000 gallons; that of the old tunnel is 50,000,000 gallons. The cost of the old lake tunnel was $457,844.95; of the new lake tunnel, $411.510.16; and of the land extension of the latter, about $515,000.
THE NEW PUMPING WORKS.
The West-Side pumping works are to be erected on Ashland avenue and Twenty-second street. On Oct, 26, 1874, the contract was awarded to Messrs. Murphy & Co., Quintard Iron Works, New York, for two compound, condensing, beam-pumping engines, at a cost of $243,500, which are to be capable of raising 30,000,000 U. S. gallons 165 feet high in twenty-four hours. The duty required is 90,000,000 pounds of water rained 1 foot high with 100 pounds of coal. The engines are to be completed in November, by which time the building will be ready for their reception.
THE CRIB.
The crib was completed during the past year, in accordance with the original plan, and the structure 1s staunch and enduring. Having successfully withstood the extraordinary pressure of ice which the unusual severity of last winter caused to surround it, no fears need to be entertained for its future safety,
An application was made to the United States Lighthouse Department to place a third order Fresnel light in the tower, for tho benefit of navigation, and the department, anxious to comply with the request, wil place the light in position as soon aa the requisite legislation can be secured, a special act of Congress. being necessary, as the Board declined to cede the jurisdiction required by the general law regulating lighthouses.
During the coming year a large fog-bell will be placed in the crib, which, in addition to the light, will enhance the usefulness of the crib for our lake commerce.
Telegraphic cables have been laid between the pumping works and the crib, through the new lake tunnel, which will insure prompt communication at all times.
The following table exhibits the quantity and coat of paces laid since 1801, including the coat of ave river tunnels for carrying water maias to consect the three divisions of the city:
The average cost of pipe for the year was $50.27 per ton.
FIRE HYDRANTS.
A large portion of the appropriation for water pipe is spent in constructing hydrants and their connections on the line of the new pipe. In addition to the requirements of the new lines of pipe, there is a constant demand for the replacing of small hydrants, constructed years ago, in settlements which, in the meantime, have grown so important and become so thickly settled as to need additional protection. This expenditure, therefore, consumes a large percentage of the fund which is supposed to be spent exclusively in laying pipe, and makes the cost of pipe appear much greater than it really is. As the fire hydrants are not a part of the water service proper, but in reality a part of the fire service, and for the use of the Fire Department, it world seem that their cost should be providded for in a separate appropriation, charged to that Department, as is the case in nearly every other city in the country
Harper’s Weekly Magazine, October 20, 1883
West Side Water Works
Chicago Tribune, December 29, 1907
Great System to Provide Belter Water.
Of all the tunnels, the one styled the “southwest land tunnel” is the most extensive, This tunnel will extend from One Hundred and Fourth street and Stewart avenue east to State, north to Seventy-third street, thence east to the lake shore, and under the lake to the Sixty-eighth street crib. Another spur will extend from Seventy-third street and State to Western avenue. The new pumping station at Stewart avenue and One Hundred and Fourth street will cost $800,000. A similar station will be erected at Western avenue and Seventy-fifth street.
The tunnel extending from Chicago avenue water works to the west side pumping station at Ashland avenue and Twenty-second street will be rebuilt. Instead of going under private property, which makes the cost of maintenance enormous because of the changes in location required every time a foundation for a skyscraper is put in, the new tunnel will take a route west in Chicago avenue to Dearborn avenue, south in Dearborn avenue to Indiana street, west in Indiana to Halsted, south in Halsted to Blue Island avenue, and thence following the course of Blue Island avenue to the pumping station. The three tunnels going out into the lake from the foot of Chicago avenue will be extended to the Carter Harrison crib, and the old Chicago avenue crib will be abandoned. This change not only will give the city a purer water supply. but it will also greatly reduce the cost of maintaining the water department.
Chicago Tribune, September 6, 1908
Water Funds Are Misused.
It is charged that the west side pumping station, valued at $1,500,000, was leased to the Forest City company at an inadequate rental, and that land adjoining was purchased at a cost of $68,000 out of the waterworks funds, and now is being used by the railway company
Of the organization of the Municipal Traction company, it is charged that the original directors of the company were selected by the mayor, and that they were at the time of their election mere tools and puppets of the mayor.
It is alleged that these original incorporators and directors had no personal interest in the company, and though pretending to subscribe $10,000 of the capital stock of the company. not one of them was the real owner of a single share of the stock.
Charges Fraud in Grant.
It is charged that, prior to April 27, last, when the security grant was passed by the city council, the Municipal Traction company and Forest City railway company were creditors and depositors in the Depositors Savings and Trust company; of which Johnson was president. and Vice Mayor Lapp and Councilmen Zinner, Hanratty, and Henry, stockholders.
It is charged that these four knew that if the Forest City property was sold to the Cleveland railway company and the property of the latter leased to the Municipal Traction company, the stock of Johnson, Lapp, Zinner, Hanratty, and Henry would be made more valuable and they would be flnancially bene-fitted.
Excerpted from 1904 Chicago Public Works Annual Report
On July 12, 1872, in accordance with the recommendations made by the Board of Public Works in 1869, work was commenced on a second lake tunnel, extending from the existing crib to Chicago avenue station, and extending from that point across town to the present pumping station at 22nd street and Ash land avenue . The lake section is parallel with and 46 feet south of the first tunnel. Its diameter is 7 feet. The reasons for connecting with the old pumping station were as follows : 1st, To relieve the oldest pumps, the lift of which at times reached the limit, on account of the loss of head in the old tunnel, and to the increased pumpage. 2d. The saving in cost of pumpage by rais ing the water in the pump well. 3d, The great advantage of having two tun nels in case either one should need repairs or cleaning.
This lake tunnel was completed July 7, 1874, and the work on the land extension under another contract was commenced in July, 1873, and completed October 12, 1874. Its length, including the land extension, is 31,490 feet. The estimated velocity, when supplying 100,000,000 gallons per day, was 4 feet per second. The total cost approximated $1,000,000.
Meanwhile work was commenced on the new pumping station at Twenty second street and Ashland avenue, designed to accommodate two new engines, and arranged to allow an addition to provide for additional engines in the future. The engine and boiler-house is built of brick, faced with pressed brick and stone trimmings on the front. The engine-room is 100 feet by 66 feet, and the boiler-house 100 feet by 40 feet. The chimney is 125 feet high. The tower is 190 feet high from ground to top of masonry. The inside of the tower is cylindrical and 12 feet in diameter. The standpipe inside the tower is 5 feet diameter, 167 feet high, connected originally to the discharge main from the engine with a 30-inch branch pipe on the west side of the tower, and with pro vision for a similar connection on the east side.
The foundations for the engines included a weir well, supply well and dry well. The weir well is semicircular in form, 26 feet in diameter. The land tunnel is connected with this well by a branch tunnel 7 feet in diameter. The supply well is 44 feet long by 10 feet wide, and separated from the weir well by a brick wall, at the bottom of what is a gate 5 feet by 3 feet (operated from the basement floor of the building) to admit water to the supply well. The foundations are built of large sized blocks of stones. The south part and the walls are built on the rock, which is 44½ feet below the surface of the ground. The north part of the foundations is built on blue clay, 29½ feet below ground. The foundations of the buildings are on piles except the west wall of the engine-room, which is built on the wall of the wells, and the south wall, which, being temporary, was built on a foundation a few feet below the surface of the ground.
The contract for two compound condensing beam engines was let in 1875 to the Quintard Iron Works of New York. The general specifications for these engines provided that “each engine shall be capable of raising 15,000,000 U. S. gallons 155 feet high in twenty-four hours with a steam pressure on the boilers of 60 pounds per square inch, and develop a duty of 90,000,000 foot pounds based on 100 pounds anthracite coal.” The boilers were to be three in number, any two to furnish the required steam.
The engines were first put into operation November 6, 1876, thus increasing the pumping capacity of the water works to 104,000,000 gallons. They are so arranged that they can be operated together or separately, connection being made by a cast iron coupling. The high-pressure cylinders are 48 inches in diameter, with a stroke of 6 feet. The low-pressure cylinders are 76 inches in diameter, with a stroke of 10 feet. Each walking beam is composed of two wrought iron plates 2½ inches thick, 36 feet long between centers of end pins and 7 feet deep at center . The plates are secured 15 inches apart by cast iron sockets and bolts running through and through. The beam pillow blocks are supported on two cast iron columns with four diagonal brace columns. Each fly-wheel is of cast iron, 32 feet diameter, weighing 60 tons. The con denser is placed below the bed plate, with the air pump inside the condenser, the hot well being in upper end of the condenser castings. The air pump is 38 inches in diameter and has 4½ feet stroke. Direct acting bucket and plunger water pumps are underneath the low-pressure steam cylinders and connected with them by bolts and columns. The plungers are 36 inches diameter, with a 10-foot stroke. The pump chambers are 51 inches in diameter. The pumps are placed in the dry well. The suction nozzle is 3 feet in diameter and con nects with the supply well. The delivery nozzle from each engine is 30 inches in diameter. The air chambers placed immediately behind the pumps are 16 feet high by 5 feet diameter. With the engines were installed six horizontal return tubular boilers, each 6½ feet diameter, 17 feet long, with eighty tubes 4 inches in diameter. The boilers are set up in pairs, and are supplied with water by independent steam pumps connected with hot wells, supply well and water mains. A formal duty and capacity test of the new engines was made in Janu ary, 1877, in accordance with the requirements of the specifications, with the result that the west engine developed a duty of 99,083,000 foot pounds with a capacity of 16,160,470 gallons in twenty-four hours. The east engine showed a duty of 96,066,800 foot pounds with a capacity of 15,571,970 gallons.
It might be interesting to note at this point that the average daily consumption of water during 1876 was 41,931,481 gallons. This, based on the population of 407,000, shows a daily consumption per capita of 106 gallons. The total number of miles of mains was 416.4, the number of house services or taps was 57,130, and the water revenue was $831,555. Number of hydrants, 2,901; stop valves, 2,590, and meters, 1,446. Total cost of water works, $8,179,158. The area of the City through successive extensions had increased to 36.66 square miles.
Chicago Tribune, December 19, 1909
Have you ever thought of the history of the glass of water you draw from a faucet? Of the original source of the water, of the course it travels to reach us, of the engineering difficulties and the cost?
Because of a highly efficient water supply system it is such an easy ratter to obtain it that we easily acquire the habit of taking its supply for granted, without thinking. like the air we breathe.
It is a simple matter for the individual citizen to turn on the water and use as much as he needs without limit, but it is quite a different and difficult matter for the city engineer, acting for the great body of citizens, to provide water for over 2,000,000 people, as much of it as they want, every hour of the twenty-four, and to distribute it over an area of 196 square miles.
When you turn the faucet to draw water you make connection with an immense system of water mains, pumping stations, and water tunnels, the total approximate cost of which is estimated at $50,000,000. Thou sands of other people, probably hundreds of thou-sands. are being supplied at the same time.
From the Lake to the Cup.
The travels of the eupful of water drawn at the faucet might be shown by an imaginary motion picture. The water enters one of the intake cribs placed deep in the lake at distances from two to four miles from shore. The care of the cribs requires a cret of from five to twenty men, including the keeper, helpers, and deep sea divers. They keep the port holes, fish screens, shaft gates, wells, and shafts in constant running order. and fight off foreign matter and the continually forming ice during the winter months. The city tug service keeps them in touch with the world on shore.
The water passes through the port holes of the crib into a big well and down through a cylinder or shaft, varying from six to fourteen feet in diameter. to the water tunnel below the bed of the lake, in some instances fifty feet, and others 160 feet, below water level. The tunnels, varying from six feet to fourteen feet inside diameter, carrying the water to wells under the pumping stations at various locations on shore. Powerful pumping engines, those in the larger stations having a capacity of 40,000,000 gallons every twenty-four hours, pump the water up through the shaft from the large well below and force it through the distributing mains to the various sections of the city and it finally arrives at your faucet.
Each station has its chief engineer, machinists and helpers, and huudreds of men are laboring on the water pipe mains, operating them and repairing and extending them. There are about 2,300 miles of water mains. Placed in line, they would nearly reach from Chicago to San Francisco. According to available statistics, it is probably the most extensive system of water pipes and mains in the world.
Water Supply Always Most Important.
Water is indispensable. It is of more primary importance to life than food. It is necessary to public health and cleanliness. A community might do without light, fire protection, transportation, or any other public service, if necessary, but an adequate water supply is absolutely necessary to human as well as municipal existence. Springs, wells, lakes, and rivers have always been from the times of the ancients the principal sources of water supply. Obtaining water from wells was probably the earliest method.
Before the beginning of the Christian era the Chinese dug wells 1,500 feet deep, employing practically the same methods now in vogue. The Romans found that the polluted waters of the Tiber caused disease and death high above the normal rate, and, in their solution of the question, became the greatest builders in the world of water tunnels and aqueducts. Their aqueducts are unsurpassed even today as feats of construction and engineering. They brought pure water from mountain rivers fifty to ane hundred miles away. One aqueduct, built in the first century, still brings water to Rome from the original source (Marcia). ‘They built the Pont du Gard, near Nimes, France, one of the notable aqueducts of the world.
The conduit is carried across a valley about 400 feet wide, supported by three tiers of beautifully proportioned arches, 181 feet high. It is still in use. Another noteworthy Roman aquaduct, still in use, is at Metz, France.
Paris, also, found it necessary to go back to nature, far from cities and civilization, to obtain pure water. That city has two aqueducts, one 81 and the other 108 miles long. The water is use entirely for domestic purposes; filtered water being used for fire, streets, fountains, and other public service. London obtains most of its supply from wells in the chalk hills and filtered river water. Supply service covering only certain hours of the day was at first established and still exists in many of the districts.
New Aqueduct Tremendous Work.
New York carries water for thirty miles from the Croton dam, and to meet the increasing demand has a tremendous proposition, from an engineering and financial point of view, in building the Catskill aqueduct, which will have a capacity of 500,000,000 gallons every twenty-four hours, to bring water from the Catskill mountains. The Los Angeles aqueduct, bringing water from the mountains 200 miles away, is a work that is commanding world wide attention.
Considering the difficult problems encountered by. other cities that must bring water from great distances at’ enormous expense, Chicagoans have cause to rejoice and be glad. Situated upon the shores of a large body of fresh water, furnishing an inexhaustible supply at its doors. Chicago stands alone among the largest cities of the world in the superiority of its natural advantages.
The town of Chiego was incorporated in 1834 with 330 inhabitants. The city of Chicago was incorporated in 1837. At that time the water supply was obtained from wells, the Chicago river, and Lake Michigan. If in those days water from wells had been distributed in oriental fashion by beautiful maidens carrying earthen jars it might be picturesque and romantic to live them over again. But Chicago methods were far from being those of the picturesque, orient. Four-fifths of the town was supplied by the cart system, operated by private capital. Water was peddled about and, sold by measure, after the milk wagon method of distribution. The territory was easily covered, for the boundaries of the original city were Lake Michigan on the east, Center avenue to La Salle and North avenue on the north, Wood street on the west, and Twenty-second street on the south.
System Starts from Single Well.
The first public undertaking for water supply by the city of which there is record was a contract awarded by the city council for the building of a well at Cass street and Michigan avenue for $95.50. From that modest beginning the water supply system of Chicago has been enlarged, improved, and extended until the total original cost of the various departments of the system was estimated on Dee. 31, 1908, at $49.446.780, and the area of distribution at 196 square miles. It is interesting to note that the appraised value of the properties on that date was $14.563.709, showing that the water works property is on a substantial basis.
There are ten pumping stations, with thirty-four pumping engines and eighty boilers, thirty-seven miles of tunnels and five intake cribs. In the system of water mains there are 2.189 miles of water pipe, 18,782 valves, 22,692 fire hydrants. and 372,835 taps. The total expenditures for operating the system in 1908 were approximately $2,700,000. The total pumping capacity of all the plants amounts to 650,600,000 gallons every twenty-four hours and the average daily pumpage 467,772,000 gallons. Based upon an assumed population of 2,300,000, this supply averages 204 gallons every twenty-four hours per capita.
Municipal ownership and the history of Chicago’s water supply system began in 1851, when the city took over the rights and franchise of the Chicago Hydraulie company, a private corporation that up to that time had furnished most of the water supply.
The unparalleled rapidity of Chicago’s growth in area and population has given the water supply department many difficult engineering and financial prob-lems. It often seemed almost impossible to keep pace with the constantly mereasing population and necessity for more water. New pumps of greater capacity were put into old pumping stations, new stations were erected, and new water tunnels were constructed in a worthy endeavor to meet the demands. But in the few years of time needed to complete the improvements the population increased beyond expectations, and the city found itself face to face with the same old problem of providing more water.
First Station Built in 1853.
In 1853 the first pumping station erected by the city of Chicago was begun at the foot of Chicago avenue, near the lake, ‘known as the North pumping station. A wooden pipe, thirty inches in diameter, running 600 feet into the lake, supplied the water. There were about two miles of wooden distributing mains.
Additions to the city were made in 1853, 1863, and 1869, and although the capacity of the pumping station was increased it was necessary in 1869 to build the West station, on Ashland avenue near Twenty-second street, obtaining water from the first crib. The eity continued to grow rapidly, north, south, and west, and the water supply was soon inadequate. The Harrison street station, at Harrison street, near Des. plaines, was put into service in 1890, and the Fourteenth street station. at Fourteenth street and Indiana avenue, in 1891. The Four Mile crib was built out in the lake from Fourteenth street to supply these stations.
A memorable addition to the city of Chicago was made in 1889, when the city of Lake Vlew and the towns of: Hyde Park, Lake, and Jefferson were an-nexed, adding 126 square miles to its area and giving the city a frontage on Lake Michigan of twenty-two miles. These towns already had water supply systems, and after annexation plans were made and executed to combine them and distribute from the Hyde Park station at Sixty-eighth street. Water for these systems was obtained in 1885 through iron pipes extend-ing 1,000 feet out into the lake, and from 1885 to 1894 through a tunnel terminating in a submerged crib about one mile from shore. Since 1894 the Hyde Park station has obtained its water supply from the Hyde Park crib, which was built about two miles off shore from Sixty-eighth street.
Crib Built to Supply Lake View.
Lake View has its own waterworks plant. To supply this station and district a new water tunnel terminating at the Lake View crib, two miles from shore, was completed in 1896.
In 1890 the Washington Heights district was an-nexed. It had a pumping station and pipe system supplied by water from a deep well. This system was improved and operated till the supply was found to be Inadequate, when, in 1895, water was supplied from the Hyde Park station.
The village of Norwood was annexed in 1893. Its water was obtained from artesian wells, pumped into a standpipe, and distributed through a system of anti. quated wooden mains.
A new tunnel system terminating with two new stations, one the Central Park avenue station and thi other the Springfield avenue station, was constructed’ and put into operation in 1900. The Carter H. Harrison crib, three miles off shore from Chicago avenue, was built to supply these stations.
In 1898 the construction of an elaborate system of large mains was begun, in order to combine as far as possible the various water pipe systems. Pifty miles of large distributing mains, varying in size from one foot to four feet, and hundreds of miles of smaller mains were laid.
The village of Rogers Park was annexed to the city in 1893. The waterworks plant was operated by a private corporation until recently, when it was taken over by the city.
Table Shows Stations’ Capacities.
The following table gives the several pumping stations and their capacity after recent Improvements and the new Roseland station and Edward F. Dunne crib will have been completed:
Additions and improvements at an estimated cost of $5,000,000 are planned to take care of demands for water supply as far in the future as 1919. The total pumping capacity of the various stations at that time will probably be 940,000,000 gallons daily, and the estmated amount per capita runs from 230 gallons to 250 gallons a day.
The present per capita pumpage of about 204 gallons every day is high in comparison to that of other large cities. Competent and experienced engineers say that it Is twice as much as is necessary. and that 100 gal-lens per capita should give a lavish supply of water for every one. As it has long been suspected that much of the water pumped was lost and wasted, an Investigation was made to determine the legitimate use of water and the leakage and waste. The results were astonishing.
Over 75 Per Cent Wasted.
It was definitely determined that a fraction over 75 per cent of water pumped was wasted. A better conception of this enormous waste can be given In fig-ures. The average pumpage in 1908 was 467,772.000 gallons daily, and the amount wasted, according to the city’s claim of a waste of 75 per cent, would be 350,-829.000 gallons a day. Who is guilty?
The city engineer earnestly urges the adoption of some method that will do away with this useless waste and claims that it can be accomplished by the use of meters on part of the service. He believes that it would save the taxpayers at least a half million dollars a year without restricting in any way legitimate use of water. The free use of water is good for the welfare of the community and is encouraged. The idea is to prevent waste and leakage that serve no purpose whatever.
Claims are made, based upon conclusions drawn by eminent engineers after observing actual conditions in other cities, that If meters were installed every year until 40 per cent of the service was metered, the pumpage would be much less than It is now, even considering the natural Increase in the per capita con sumption. In that event little would have to be ex pended In extension of pumping for many years to come, while on the other hand, If nothing is done to change present conditions, an average expenditure of at least $600,000 a year will be necessary for new tunnels and pumping plants alone.
An odd phase of the question is the part that the taxpayer plays. It is a quadruple röle. He bears the burden of the cost as cheerfully as possible: he com plains bitterly If he does not have enough water; he objects loudly if the tax is increased instead of de creased; and after all he is responsible the wasteful and thoughtless one for the enormous waste of was ter, the Increase necessary in the supply, and the cons sequent increased expense to himselt.
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