NYC Street Furniture Part 1: Water Testing Station

These are dotted around all over the city to monitor the water quality. Most are overseen by humans, though one is monitored by a hamster.

Made of heavy cast iron and standing around four and a half feet tall, these silver sentinels regurgitate water direct from the main, on command, to the DEP testing engineers. Some stats:

• 1,300 water samples per month are collected from testing stations in 488 locations.
  
• Bacteria, chlorine levels, pH, inorganic and organic pollutants, turbidity, and odor are monitored.
  
• 892 sampling stations have been installed across the city.
  
• $11 Million = cost of building and installing the testing stations

Manhattan’s first public well was dug in 1677 by the fort at Bowling Green. One hundred years later, when the population had reached 22,000, a reservoir was dug on the east side of Broadway.

Now the city’s water can come from over 100 miles away up in the Catskill/Delaware Watersheds. There’s a quiz for kids over at the Department of Environmental Protection’s website where you can also check on the current status of the water system.

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