Water Supply

Report Outline
Mounting Concern Over Water Shortages
Measures to Remedy Water Shortages
Action to Avert Future Shortages
Special Focus

Mounting Concern Over Water Shortages

Water cannot be taken for granted. This fact, well understood in the western United States, has been brought forcefully to the attention of other sections by the deepening water emergency in the City of New York. Voluntary measures to reduce domestic consumption have failed to produce the necessary saving, and rationing of water to the city's industries is now in early prospect.

The New York emergency is causing other cities to look to their water resources. Baltimore and Washington are seeking loans to extend their water facilities. An engineer of the U. S. Geological Survey told a congressional committee, Jan. 16, that there are “fifty or more places where the situation is not extremely critical right now, but it could be next month or next year.” The places named included parts of New England, the Middle Atlantic states, the Gulf states, and the Middle West.

New York's shortage does not result from any long-term decrease in available water. The last six months have been abnormally dry, but drier periods in 1941 and 1944 brought no call for emergency measures. The real trouble lies in a 25 per cent increase in water use during and since the war. Only abnormally high precipitation in 1947 and 1948 masked the fact that the city was overdrawing the normal storage capacity of its reservoirs. Use must be curtailed until new reservoirs can be completed. Washington can get plenty of water from the Potomac, but the city's water consumption sometimes exceeds the dependable capacity of its conduits from the river by more than ten per cent.