The Chicago water supply is abundant, but water conservation is still needed so the fresh water resource isn't depleted. Water quality is concern for not only Chicago's water supply, but also for water supplies around the world.
Chicago, Illinois, is situated on the banks of Lake Michigan, one of the world's largest fresh water supplies. Yet the lake was the last water supply to which the city's residents turned.
Early pioneers drew water from the Chicago River until that became too polluted. Settlers then turned to shallow wells and, often as a last resort, lake water. Lake water had to be hauled in barrels and wagons, or purchased from itinerant water-peddlers.
Chicago's first piped water supply was established in 1842 at a cost of $24,000, by a private firm, The Chicago Hydraulic Company. Lake water was pumped to an elevated wooden tank from which gravity distributed it through wooden pipes laid under the town's streets.
This private system proved inadequate in both capacity and water quality. Following several outbreaks of cholera, the city fathers commissioned a municipally-owned water supply system in 1851. The new system launched in 1854, pumping up to 8 million gallons of lake water per day through cast iron mains with a steam-driven walking-beam pump fondly known as "Old Sally".
At first, Chicago's water commission focused on laying mains to areas considered especially vulnerable to fire and disease, including the downtown business district, the poorest neighborhoods, and the wealthiest districts. Public fire hydrants protected these areas against flame, and the poor who could not afford direct water connections drew their water supply from the hydrants.
But by 1864, the water commission began refusing to extend water mains to new districts unless business and property owners fronted the costs of construction. Poor residents of multi-tenant buildings often shared a single tap required by municipal regulations. Some middle-class home buyers went without expensive water connections to save building costs. Others migrated to subdivisions in which water connections already existed. The wealthy paid for water connections as a matter of course.
The Chicago water commission's original plan recognized that purer water could be obtained by extending pump inlets far out into Lake Michigan, away from shoreline concentrations of manmade pollution. The first water tunnel dug to reach this purer water was completed in 1867. It extended two miles, buried 60 feet beneath the bottom of Lake Michigan. A new pumping station completed in 1869 was connected to this intake "crib", and still serves Chicago today.
From the intake crib, water flowed by gravity to shore-based pumps purification plants. Enormous pumps raise the water 20 feet above lake level, and gravity drives it through the purification process. Water flows first through a chemical treatment plant, then to coagulation and settling chambers where solids are filtered out, and then to reservoirs that feed the distribution system.
The famous Chicago Water Tower, located at Michigan and Chicago avenues, was erected in 1869 to equalize pressure and keep water flowing smoothly from taps. It survived the Great Chicago Fire of 1871, and became the first American Water Landmark upon its centennial anniversary in 1969.
Three more tunnels and pumping stations were added as the city grew. Many disparate water systems were assimilated through annexation and integrated into the Chicago water supply.
Today, Chicago's waterworks supplies over a billion gallons of clean water per day to over five million people. The system delivers water over an area of 836 square miles to residential, commercial, and industrial customers. About 32 percent of Chicago's water production flows to outlying suburbs that store it in their own reservoirs.
Chicago is one of the nation's largest cities, and the availability of such a large fresh water supply is one of the main reasons the city has been able to grow. The Chicago water supply is abundant. Hopefully the citizens appreciate it and learn to treasure it so conditions like those of the middle 1800s don't return.
Chicago has the nastiest tasting water I've ever had the displeasure to drink! My grandparents lived in Homewood, a Chi suburb. My grandma always kept water in the fridge for drinking, but even when chilled the water tasted bad, though not nearly as bad straight from the tap!