High Bridge and high service works & reservoir

Highbridge Reservoir was a

reservoir A reservoir (; from French ''réservoir'' ) is an enlarged lake behind a dam. Such a dam may be either artificial, built to store fresh water or it may be a natural formation. Reservoirs can be created in a number of ways, including contro ...

in the

New York City water supply system A combination of aqueducts, reservoirs, and tunnels supplies fresh water to New York City. With three major water systems ( Croton, Catskill, and Delaware) stretching up to away from the city, its water supply system is one of the most exte ...

, which received water from a portion of the

Croton Aqueduct The Croton Aqueduct or Old Croton Aqueduct was a large and complex water distribution system constructed for New York City between 1837 and 1842. The great aqueducts, which were among the first in the United States, carried water by gravity fro ...

system. It was located on Amsterdam Avenue between 172nd Street and 174th Street, in

Upper Manhattan Upper Manhattan is the most northern region of the New York City borough of Manhattan. Its southern boundary has been variously defined, but some of the most common usages are 96th Street, the northern boundary of Central Park (110th Street), ...

adjacent to the High Bridge Water Tower and the High Bridge across the

Harlem River The Harlem River is an tidal strait in New York, United States, flowing between the Hudson River and the East River and separating the island of Manhattan from the Bronx on the New York mainland. The northern stretch, also called the Spuyt ...

Valley. The reservoir covered about , was deep, and had a total capacity of .

History

In 1863, the

New York Legislature The New York State Legislature consists of the two houses that act as the state legislature of the U.S. state of New York: The New York State Senate and the New York State Assembly. The Constitution of New York does not designate an official te ...

authorized construction of the reservoir and

water tower A water tower is an elevated structure supporting a water tank constructed at a height sufficient to pressurize a distribution system for potable water, and to provide emergency storage for fire protection. Water towers often operate in conju ...

to supply water pressure to buildings located at high elevations in the surrounding area. The project was designed by

John B. Jervis John Bloomfield Jervis (December 14, 1795 – January 12, 1885) was an American civil engineer. America's leading consulting engineer of the antebellum era (1820–60), Jervis designed and supervised the construction of five of America's earliest ...

, the chief engineer of the Croton Aqueduct. Construction began in 1866 and was completed in 1872. Steam engines pumped water up from the aqueduct approximately into the reservoir and then pumped it another to the top of the water tower in to a tank with a capacity of . By 1934, the reservoir had not been used for fifteen years and was proposed by New York State Office of Parks, Recreation and Historic Preservation Commissioner, Robert Moses, as the site of a new park. In the spring of 1934, Highbridge Reservoir was taken over by the Office of Parks for the construction of the Highbridge Play Center of

Highbridge Park Highbridge Park is a public park on the western bank of the Harlem River in Washington Heights, Manhattan, New York City. It stretches between 155th Street and Dyckman Street in Upper Manhattan. The park is operated by the New York City Depa ...

, including an outdoor swimming pool.

References

Notes {{authority control History of New York City Cultural history of New York City Reservoirs in New York (state) Water infrastructure of New York City Reservoirs in Manhattan