New York City is spending $350,000,000 to have a pure and abundant water supply. This is the tunnel which will bring the water from the Catskill Mountains to New York City.
Water Supplies.—One of the greatest assets to the health of a large city is pure water. By pure water we mean water free from all organic impurities, including germs. Water from springs and deep driven wells is the safest water, that from large reservoirs next best, while water that has drainage in it, river water for example, is very unsafe.
The waters from deep wells or springs if properly protected will contain no bacteria. Water taken from protected streams into which no sewage flows will have but few bacteria, and these will be destroyed if exposed to the action of the sun and the constant aëration (mixing with oxygen) which the surface water receives in a large lake or reservoir. But water taken from a river into which the sewage of other towns and cities flows must be filtered before it is fit for use.
The city of Lowell in 1891 took its water without filtering, i.e. from the Merrimack River at the point shown on the map.
Typhoid fever broke out in North Chelmsford and about two weeks later cases began to appear in Lowell until a great epidemic occurred. Explain this outbreak. Each black dot is a case of typhoid.
Typhoid fever germs live in the food tube, hence the excreta of a typhoid patient will contain large numbers of germs. In a city with a system of sewage such germs might eventually pass from the sewers into a river. Many cities take their water supply directly from rivers, sometimes not far below another large town. Such cities must take many germs into their water supply. Many cities, as Cleveland and Buffalo, take their water from lakes into which their sewage flows. Others, as Albany, Pittsburgh, and Philadelphia, take their drinking water directly from rivers into which sewage from cities above them on the river has flowed. Filtering such water by means of passing the water through settling basins and sand filters removes about 98 per cent of the germs. The result of drinking unfiltered and filtered water in certain large cities is shown graphically at right. In cities which drain their sewage into rivers and lakes, the question of sewage disposal is a large one, and many cities now have means of disposing of their sewage in some manner as to render it harmless to their neighbors.
Filter beds at Albany, N. Y.