Evening star., 1921-03-06

water supply should now br mad" and tho
work commenced without undue delay.
One of the Iangftt plans was "A
combined water supply and power
project and the general features .oi
that plan Were:
III The construc; .on Of a high dam in the
Potomac river. nearly on til" northwest bound,
ary line OF the District Of Columbia and about
one-third OF q mile above the Chain bridge
90 The generation Of power by utilizing
the head thus created and the transmission and
distribution of the power
t3I Increasing the wafer supply by pump
ing t" Daie'ariia reservoir from the pool formed
by the dam.
GD EnIarging the capacity of delivery he
tween Dalecarl;a reservoir and the filtration
PLANT at the Mcmillan Park reservoir.
The plan comprehended a dam rs
feet at Little Falls and the crea-
ton of lake. tentatively named
Lake Meigs. in honor of the great
Army engineer who planned and di-
rected the construction of the Wash
ington aqueduct from Great Falls to
this city. The upper end of that
lake would be in the gorge below
Great Falls. The following para
graph is taken from that old report:
lake which would be created by the high dam
proposed is 10 feet above low water of the
Potomac river. just above Chain bridge. The
total fall at low stages from the water sur
face above Great Falls TO the point at which
the dam is to he placed is apDroxima tely 100
feet II that head were concentrated within
short distance of Great Falls. the construc-
tion of dam would not be desirable. but as
the fall is distributed over length OF river of
about nine miles the proposed method of de
vnlopment may wen compete with that of a
lateral canal in dealing with the large guam
titles Of water needed for the economical de
velopment of power. The elevation selected for
the lake surface is a compromise between
desire to obtain as high fall as possible and
the necessity Of reducing TO a reasonable
amount the overflow damages occasioDed by
ordinary iowage by back-water from floods.
Even with that elevation n short stretch of
the Chesapeake and Ohio canal and road of
the electric railway between Washington and
Cabin Johns bridge will be overfowed. together
with a small length of the Baltimore and Ohio
railroad.
Under authority of an act of Con-
gress approved May &c. 1908. Maj.
Jay J. Morrow. Corps Of Engineers.
made report. July s, 1909. on
studies and plans for increasing the
water supply of the District. The
following methods were discussed in
that report:
~ Ry raising the crest Of the present dam
at Great Falls.
G., Raising the elevation OF the water in
Dalecarlia reservoir by means Of pumps.
q, BY building conduit tunnel from
Great Falls to the Mcmillan Park reservoir
similar to the present This is generally
designated the paraHel-lne project
Little Falls to Dafecarlia reservoir and
conduit and tunnel TO Mcmillan Park reservoir
90 BY pumping from the Potomac river at
some point south Of the Aqueduct bridge to Nc.
MILAN Park reservoir
go BY taking the additional supply from
Rock Creek.
% BY taking the additional supply from
Seneca Creek.
tsb BY sinking deep wells in the water
bearing strata and pumping.
90 By supply from the upper branches of
the Potomac river
OF those projects. the only one ia
vorably considered was that of build
ing a new conduit and tunnel from
Great Falls to Mcmillan Park reser-
voir. In the meantime the Patuxent
river as source of supply was sug-
gested. but definite recommenda-
tion was not made. because there
had been no investigation of that
river. Congress, in an act approved
March 2. 1911. authorized such an in
vestigation, and Lieut.. Col. W c.