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Brooklyn's Thirsty Hunt for Water

Queens and Nassau supplies were tapped

By Bill Bleyer | Staff Writer

The City of Brooklyn was running out of water.

In the mid-19th Century, the city's population was soaring and wells were running dry or becoming contaminated. Engineering studies convinced city officials that the way to go lay to the east in Queens, which then included what is now Nassau County.

So private companies and then the city itself began acquiring land in Queens. Wells were drilled, ponds enlarged and streams diverted to create a water supply network, according to a 1992 study by historians Richard Winsche and Harrison Hunt.

Those efforts would alter the landscape of Long Island. But the water network would turn out to be a boon for the suburbs in ways no one could anticipate. It set the scene for a major roadway that spurred development and population growth. And it preserved open space for the state park system.

But the short-run impact in Queens was severe: The water table dropped, wells dried up, mills lost their power source and the oyster industry was undermined because of changes in salinity.

The initial attempt to quench Brooklyn's thirst began with the formation of private water companies in 1852. Within six years, the Nassau Water Co. had acquired a string of South Shore ponds from Jamaica to Hempstead. Brooklyn bought out Nassau Water in 1857. The following year a reservoir was built in Ridgewood.

But by 1870, Brooklyn's population had grown to 400,000. The city needed another reservoir and bought 557 acres in Hempstead that included three mill ponds.Construction began the following year on a 22-foot-high dam that Brooklyn water commissioners estimated would form a reservoir containing a billion gallons of water. They ignored earlier engineering studies that showed much of this water would disappear into the permeable sand. Ultimately, the reservoir -- now part of Hempstead Lake State Park -- could only contain a third of its estimated capacity.

And Brooklyn was still swelling. By 1880, its population had soared to almost 600,000, precipitating a new water shortage. This was met by sinking new wells in Queens. Then the Brooklyn Bridge opened in 1883, unleashing a new housing explosion. By 1890, the population had reached 800,000.

Now the city fathers decided to extend their conduits east from Rockville Centre to Massapequa. All of the more than 300 properties acquired in Queens between 1853 and 1887 had been obtained through negotiated purchases. In 1887, Brooklyn politicians pushed for a shortcut. They lobbied for a bill in Albany that would give them the right of eminent domain to acquire land in Queens and Suffolk.

The Hempstead Inquirer blasted Brooklyn for ``sapping . . . the very life-blood of Queens County.'' The newspaper noted that ``Long Island is not blessed with much more than enough to supply her own needs.''

Queens County officials attempted to block further encroachment by Brooklyn or at least to regulate the amount of water taken. But Brooklyn had more political clout and the legislation passed.

The 10-mile extension to Massapequa began in 1889. Two miles east of Rockville Centre, a 400-million gallon reservoir was constructed. To help the water along, a large pumping station was erected on the Freeport-Baldwin border. The Milburn Pumping Station in Freeport turned out to be one of the most extraordinary and beautiful industrial structures ever built on Long Island. Frank Freeman, a Brooklynite and a master of Romanesque revival architecture, was commissioned to design the 300-foot-long pumping structure.

Work began on the conduits and pumping station in 1890. By the end of the next year, the pumping station was almost completed and its equipment was tested. Unfortunately, there was still a gap in the pipes at Rockville Centre and the huge surge of water inundated workers. But a week later the pumping station was pushing water to Brooklyn around the clock. By 1907 the system was supplying about 85 percent of the 145 million gallons a day consumed in Brooklyn.

The creation of Greater New York City in 1898 put the New York City Board of Water Supply in control. By 1917, a new Catskill aqueduct started 12 years before was supplying most of the city's water.

In the 1920s the city began paying Nassau County $80,000 a year in taxes for the water system property. To cut their tab, city officials suggested building a highway above their pipeline. The state Legislature authorized the plan, and the result was Sunrise Highway. It was dedicated on June 8, 1929.

The city also dedicated 2,200 acres in Nassau to the Long Island State Park Commission in 1925. This land would be transformed into the Southern State, Meadowbrook, Wantagh and Bethpage Parkways and Valley Stream and Hempstead Lake State Parks. While the city retained the right to pump water, its dependence on the old system continually dropped until it was used only in emergencies, the last time in a 1965-66 drought.

In 1977, when the system was obsolete, Nassau gained ownership of the pumping station. The county obtained the property around the station and 1,750 additional acres of watershed land four years later. The remaining water system property was purchased by the county in 1986.

Nassau considered using the pumping station for its public works department or an aviation museum. In 1986 it was sold to developer Gary Melius, who had restored the Otto Kahn mansion in Cold Spring Hills. A 1985 fire that destroyed much of the building has stalled restoration plans, but Melius is still hoping that he can convert the building into a nursing facility.