November 25, 2023 • 47 mins
Getting the rain and melted snow from upstate NY into the taps of every NYC resident and business is one of the great feats of engineering. Does it taste great and make perfect bagels and pizza crust? Sources say yes! Learn all about it in this classic episode.
See omnystudio.com/listener for privacy information.
Mark as Played
Transcript
Episode Transcript
Available transcripts are automatically generated. Complete accuracy is not guaranteed.
Speaker 1 (00:00):
Hell to everybody. I hope you're having a lovely Saturday
wherever you are in the world. Chuck, here with a
Saturday Select selection, and I'm going to go with from
November twenty nineteen, not even so long ago, as the
Crow Flies. The episode is NYC Water Colon an Engineering Marvel.
(00:21):
I love New York City. Everyone knows that I go
on and on about that city on the show, and
I'm constantly amazed that city runs, and that the trash
gets taken away and the mail gets delivered, and that
people have enough drinking water and water to bathe in
and cook with. And so it's a pretty unique situation
(00:45):
there in New York how they get their water. And
here's that story. Please to enjoy. Welcome to Stuff You
Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's
Charles so B, Chuck Bryant, there's guest producer Andrew. This
is Stuff you should Know. Let's get this a.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I'm excited about this one.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
This was your pick and I was like, what is
Chuck talking about? Were you really yes? And then Chuck,
I happened to stumble upon I don't know what I
was looking for, but an email from somebody who sent
like a Google doc or something that was a list
of episodes we said we should do, and people have
(01:39):
set those in before, but this one was kind of
condensed and that was on there. So I've stumbled upon
your dirty little secret.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
I don't think that's where I got it. Oh really,
I don't think so, but maybe Okay, I just know
that I am always fascinated by not only New York City,
but by the fact that New York City functions with
that many people and all that everything. It's just all
amazing to me that that city functions with that many people,
(02:09):
that many buildings, that like, I want to do an
episode on out trash removal.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Okay, I want to do one on the mail on
wastewater treatment. Yeah, oh yeah, that's just New York in general.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
That's been long brewing.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Are you okay with that?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Just I mean, we can mention New York or whatever.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Big thanks to Dave Ruse though, one of our great writers.
They put this together and it's really really fascinating.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Dave's just an amazing human. All of our writers are amazing,
for sure. Dave is great as well. He's one of
a few select amazing people.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Right.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
So the reason why New York, why anybody would ask
about New York's water is because if you've ever interacted
with the New Yorker, they talk about their water a lot.
It's like kind of a thing in New York where
they're like, our tap water is the best water in
the country, and they have like a lot of stuff
to back that up with, and so much so that
(03:06):
that they say this, this water is actually the reason
why our bagels and our pizza are so good.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, I was. We were both just there for our
final shows of the year at the Bellhouse thanks to
people who came out. Yes, they were great, a lot
of fun. And by the way, the guy that fell
asleep on the front row on night number two, I
think it was night number two. I was walking down
the street and he randomly passed by driving in a
(03:33):
car and rolled down his window and said, hey man,
He said great show the other night.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
Right, And I was waiting for him to say, is
that Freedom Rock?
Speaker 1 (03:43):
And I said thanks dude, I was like front row
And he was so excited that I remembered that, and
he said front row and he drove on before I
had a chance to say you fell asleep.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
He's like, I feel like I was there. Maybe I
felt like a dream too.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
I don't know, but we were just there. And there
are many many restaurants in New York where there will
be like a water cooler or a place where you
can help yourself to your own cup of water, and
it will have a big sign on it that says
New York City tap water and proud all caps underlined letters.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Yeah, And they mean like they're just getting water out
of the tap, Whereas in other cities that's a dirty,
shameful secret that people don't talk about.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
In New York, they proudly boast about it. And just
the fact that New York or any New Yorker in
the city gets water at all is pretty spectacular. It's
like you said, there's a lot of people, there's a
lot of buildings, and something like more than a billion
gallons of water flow into New York through the taps
(04:49):
every day.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yeah, I said day with the d yes. It is
the largest water system in the United States. People from
all over the world, government officials fly in and take
meetings with the New York City water people just to see,
like how have you done it?
Speaker 2 (05:10):
They're just agog, how could we do better? So that's
impressive enough that a billion, more than a billion gallons
of water is delivered every day to New Yorkers. Pretty great.
But the idea that you can just drink it straight
from the tap and it is ninety percent unfiltered, yeah,
that is a truly impressive feat.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Yeah. And by ninety percent unfiltered, we mean ninety percent
of the water is unfiltered and ten percent is filtered.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Right, And you might say, look, how can you just
filter ninety percent of the water. Well, it comes from
different places, that's right. So ninety percent of the water
comes from two places, two watersheds that combined are called
the Catskill Delaware Watershed or water system I think. And
then the other one from the Crow Croton I always
want to say Crow toWin. Yeah, but from the Croton Reservoir.
(06:01):
That ten percent is actually filtered. We'll get into all
of that. But ninety percent of New York's water is not.
It doesn't go through a filtering process. And that makes
New York one of only five major cities in the
United States to get a waiver from the EPA that
says your water is so deliciously pure and delightful that
(06:22):
you don't need to filter it. Almost every other city
has to have a filtering process before it gets delivered
to taps.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
That's right. And the other four naturally Seattle, Portland, Oregon,
San Francisco. The one that's a bit of a surprise
is Boston, Massachusetts.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
What's that's how surprising it is, Chuck, Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
So let's talk a little bit about the history of
New York and their water, because back in the day,
we've always talked about how what a disgusting, disease ridden
poop and horse urine ridden place New York City was.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Yeah, supposedly there's a good twelve inches of horse manure
on the street at all times. They before they really
started cleaning their place up.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, it's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
I think that was in the wind Criest Typhoid Marry episode,
which is a great.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
One, another great New York episode. So if we're talking
New Amsterdam, pre New York City, they got water where
you would think from ponds and natural springs, underwater springs,
and they had a forty eight acre pond it's about
sixty feet deep in Tribeca. What is now Tribeca called
the Collect and also the little Collect that was just
(07:36):
south of there, And that name comes from the Dutch
word caulk, which means small body of water. And the
Collect was where they got their water for a long
time until the city let some tanners built a tannery
on the shores of the Collect, not smart New York,
which ruined everything.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, because it started to get polluted. They all were
able to drill wells and stuff around places where people
pooped and peed and then dump their poop and pee.
It was a dirty, dirty place because this is pre
germ theory, or at least around the time the germ
theory was being developed and people didn't understand it. And
I think it was our great stink episode where they
(08:19):
traced a colera epidemic to a public well, a public
water pump. John Snow, if I remember correctly did that.
And this would have been around the time that New
Yorkers were suffering from cholera epidemics, one of which took
place in I think the eighteen thirties, eighteen thirty two.
It killed thirty five hundred New Yorkers and that was
a substantial amount of the population at the time, and
(08:43):
another one hundred thousand New Yorkers had to flee just
to get away from this colera epidemic, and it was
because their sewage and their water was coexisting in very
unhealthy ways. So New York said, maybe we should try
something else. Let's look a little further outside the city
where we're dumping our waists and everything. See if we
can get our water from there.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
And they did.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
They built the Croton Reservoir. They damned the river, and
reservoir collected and they said, now we have some beautiful
pure water. We will never need to do anything again
to get our water.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That's right. Previous to that, though, in the eighteenth century,
they had these public pumps like you were talking about
on street corners, about every four blocks or so, a
big wooden pump where you would get your water from
underground streams and springs and stuff. But there were only
a few of these that actually delivered good water. A
(09:35):
lot of it was really brackish and gross tasting, and
Americans and early European settlers obviously loved their tea, and
so they marked this was almost like an early yelp
or whatever. They had these pumps that actually delivered like
the two or three good pumps in the city that
delivered good water labeled tea water.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Pumps, but like it was good enough to use for tea.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Good enough to use for making good tea, okay, so
they would go to these tea water pumps. You would
have to buy the water. The best one was apparently
at Chathaman Roosevelt. There was another and sort of what
the Lower east Side is today that was a good
tea water pump. And this worked out for a long
time until the collect and all this stuff. It started
(10:19):
to sort of get nasty and stinky, and so they
built a canal to channel that water into the river.
Like that, we got to get rid of it and
drain this thing. So they build this canal forty feet wide,
they channel it. Right after they finish it, this canal
begins to sink, and in eighteen twenty one it got
so bad. The smell was so bad that they eventually
(10:41):
just covered up the canal. And guess what that became.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
I don't know, Central Park Canal Street. Oh, how about
that so stupid? I wasn't even in the right part
of the city.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
That's all right.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
We've even done an episode on Central Park and that
wouldn't it forget it? Yes, Canal Street obviously.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
That's where Canal Street came from. That was literally a
canal and then eventually an underground sewage system under running
under Canal Street. Right, And there's another cool little tidbit
if you want like your little New York history, if
you like to walk around on subways and tell people
about cool things. Yeah, one of the first public reservoirs
in the city was dug by Aaron Burr and his
(11:22):
Manhattan Company, and that didn't work out. They transported it
through wooden logs as pipes bury beneath the city.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Somebody found a piece of that wooden log. It's in
one of the museums up there. Now, Oh no way, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
That is very cool. But the water didn't taste great
and it didn't work out for Aaron Burr, so he changed.
He still kept the Manhattan Company, but he got into
banking and the Manhattan Company became Chase Manhattan Bank.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
I saw somewhere that that was his aim all along,
that the water thing was just basically a fleece to
raise money to found oh really, and that that's why
the water was so shoddy and the delivery was so shoddy.
But what they were selling was so bad supposedly the
horses wouldn't even drink.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
It, So it's a scam.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
It was basically a scam. Aaron Burr was not the
greatest historical American shot Alexander Hamilton.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I know that's enough right there, right.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
And then also scammed a bunch of people out of
their water investment. That's right, because I mean, if you
want to invest in a bank, you want to invest
in a bank. If you want to invest in a
water outfit, you want to invest in a water outfit.
You want people to be above the boards with stuff
like that.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
That's right above the dogs.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
That's my tirade.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
So you mentioned the Croton Dam and the Croton Reservoir.
I want to say crow atone as well. Yeah, that
became and that aqueduct became operational and things were okay,
but then a tragedy struck with the Great Fire of
eighteen thirty.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
Five, Yes, which actually I guess that the Great Fire
took place right before the reservoir was opened, which is
why the greats are bad. Yeah. So in eighteen thirty five,
on a night in December, a warehouse caught fire and
it just leveled Lower Manhattan, like just destroyed something like
(13:11):
seventeen city blocks, fifty acres of the most densely populated
part of New York at the time, and luckily only
two people died. Was too many, but considering that it
was seventeen city blocks that got reduced to ash, that's
not bad actually, especially considering that the way that they
(13:32):
ended up fighting this fire was by setting buildings on
the perimeter on fire because they didn't have the amount
of water that they needed.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Yeah, the reason for that it was just sort of
really bad luck. They were two smaller fires that drained
our hour. Like I'm a New Yorker, listen to.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Me, you're an honorary New Yorker, I would guess.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
It drained the cisterns, the reserve cisterns that they had,
and because of those two smaller fires, they didn't have
enough to fight the Great Fire. And the long and
short of all this, as New York said, we got
to really speed up this Croton Reservoir work.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Yep, and they did. And so the Croton Reservoir was
broad online in the middle of the nineteenth century, and
they had a big old parade and everything, and it
delivered something like ninety million gallons of delicious pure water
to New York in the middle of the nineteenth century.
It was a really big deal and it worked really
(14:26):
well for a very long time. But there was also
they built the murray Hill Reservoir so the Croton Reservoir
would be where the water collected upstate. And then they
built an aqueduct system which is still around in parts today,
an elevated aqueduct to what's called the murray Hill Reservoir,
which was a four acre above ground swimming pool.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Basically, it's pretty cool if you look at pictures.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Yeah, Yeah, it was like a real spot in the
city while it was around, I think something till eighteen
forty two to nineteen hu it was around, and people
used to take strolls around it and make paintings of
it and that kind of thing. And it is where
the New York Public Library is now today, where the
Ghostbusters did some of their early work. All right, right,
(15:12):
but it worked really well for you know, the time.
But then as New York grew and grew and grew,
it became very painfully obvious yet again that New York
had outgrown its water supply.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Yeah, they needed more water. Ninety million gallons a day
wasn't enough. And then what made matters worse was in
eighteen ninety eight, New York City officially made it a
declaration that we are now not just Lower Manhattan. Of course,
they didn't call Lower Manhattan at the time, right, that
was just sort of where the city ended.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
They called it Manahattan.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, Manhattan.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
I saw that episode, by the way, it was one
of the better ones ever, which one think of what
we do in the dark. Oh, that's right, where they
go to party in Manhattan Manahattan.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Yea, what we do in the shadows? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm so stupid, that's all right. The Five Burrows were
included in eighteen nine to eight officially, so New York
and the water needed to get to the people was
officially grown to more than three million people by the
time the twentieth century turned.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Right, which is just precious today. Three million New Yorkers,
Oh my gosh, I really do. So they started to
look upstate again because they had hit upon like a
pretty good idea. The city is a cesspool. We need
our water from outside of this cesspool. And they started
looking up state. So this time they looked up to
the cat Skills and they found two watersheds, which we
(16:39):
did an episode on watersheds that I would love to forget,
but it came up just now.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
Oh I thought it was good.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
No, oh man, it was horrendous, was it? Yes? I
thought it was terrible and boring.
Speaker 1 (16:49):
January twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
I don't remember when it came out. Like I said,
I tried to forget that it ever happened.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
I thought it was pretty good.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
But anyway, So a watershed is basically a specific topographical
air area where rain, snow, whatever precipitation falls down into
this area and is delivered to a specific creek, river stream,
something like that that eventually empties into like a lake
or reservoir or something like that. So there's two watersheds,
(17:18):
the Delaware and the Catskill Watershed that put together create
something like two thousand square miles of water catching goodness,
and it delivers it to a number of different reservoirs.
And that is now today where New York gets like
ninety percent of its water.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, so you know, obviously they had to dam up
rivers to create these reservoirs, and this all happened to
you in the early nineteen hundreds. And then finally they
were like, great, We've got all these reservoirs and the Catskills,
but let me remind you, we're on the lower east
side of Manhattan, surrounded by horse hearin and a lot
of it and poop. We need our fresh water. How
(17:57):
do we get it here? So in nineteen seventeen, the
engineers of New York City completed the ninety two mile
Catskill Aqueduct YEP, which is amazing. It's basically a big
concrete tunnel that sends water ninety two miles from the
Catskills down to New York. It's as wide as thirty
(18:19):
feet in some places. It is not a tunnel the
entire length, as we will see here in a minute.
Not a continuous tunnel. I'm not sure what that means.
What is it just like open.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
There's parts of it that aren't technically a tunnel in
that it's a covered trench. Okay, they cut a trench
and then they covered it back up, which I don't
know how you do that. But it's not technically a
tunnel like a circle or tube.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Interesting, and here is to me one of the facts
of the show. You get this water down there in
the aqueduct and you get to the Hudson River, and
what are you gonna do? You gotta go under it.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Right to me, it'd just be like just pump it
in the Hudson and hope it comes out the other side.
But then I would have gotten fired immediately when night
he's no engineer. No, he's a sham.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
He's a rapscallion. So it gets to the Hudson River
and then it goes way down into the ground, about
eleven hundred feet below sea level, and then climbs back
up the other side. And it does all this via gravity.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Yes, and they did that not just to show off,
but because they decided. I read this awesome, you know
how I'm always like read the contemporary articles. I read
one from nineteen oh seven where they were talking about
the construction of the aqueduct and they said that the
reason why they were going down that far is because
they wanted to hit bedrock because it would be fissure free,
(19:44):
meaning there would be no leakage, and they could just
pump the water through the hole that they bored in
the bedrock. Well, they thought the bedrock was going to
be about five hundred feet down, and by nineteen oh
seven when they wrote the Scientific American article, they'd reached
like seven hundred feet still hadn't hit it. It ended
up being like eleven hundred feet below sea level where
they finally hit bedrock. And that's why they had to
(20:05):
drill so far down. And they drilled a tunnel, a
vertical shaft from the from the Hudson down to that tunnel,
and they built like a tube to pressurize it. So
the water eleven hundred feet under the Hudson is at
like fifteen tons per square foot of pressure, which also helps.
(20:26):
But the fact that there's no pumps or anything, it's
all gravity and pressure driven.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Yes, And sadly though, that story has a sad ending
because it took so long that their fissure free and
three T shirts were all rendered useless.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
What No, I don't know that it's a great joke.
I'm gonna go back and listen to it and I'll
probably think it's hilarious, So compliments on it in advance.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Oh man, that was a quality joke.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Three gotcha? Okay, sure, sure, yeah, yeah, yeah, I gotcha,
All right, I got you. We're all together. Now, Okay,
that is a pretty good joke.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Gee. Should we take a break after that? Yeah, all right,
let's take a break. We'll talk a little bit more
about this so called aqueduct right after this.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Stuff you should know, Josh, and shuck stuff you should know.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Okay, Chuck. So we've got the Catskill Aqueduct delivering water.
There's another one in two called the Delaware Aqueduct. And
this one actually is like a genuine tunnel.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Yes, it's eighty five miles, completed in forty four. I'm
not gonna make a T shirt joke about that. And
it is still the longest continuous tunnel in the world
at eighty five miles. And they did this all, you know,
just this digging process is amazing in and of itself,
digging these tunnels and these trenches with steam shovels and
(22:30):
pouring the concrete tunnel, which I was like, how do
you do that? Even, Yeah, you do the bottom half
let it set, and then you do the top half
and let that set. So they were like Charles Bronson
in The Great Escape. They were digging tunnels.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, I mean we're talking like dynamite and stuff like that.
Like they really did it the old school way to
build these aqueducts, and they're still in use today, so
much so that there's three tunnels. Tunnel number one and
tunnel number two have been in operation since nineteen seventeen
and nineteen thirty six. They've never stopped operating. They've never
been stopped up and drained and inspected in over one
(23:07):
hundred years. For tunnel number one.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Yeah, I think the current memo going around is I'm
sure it's fine.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Well, so they're building tunnel number three, and they decided
to start building tunnel number three nineteen fifty four. They
actually started in nineteen seventy. They are still not done
with tunnel number three.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
It's amazing.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Parts of it are online. And when it does fully
come online, tunnel number three will have a capacity enough
so that they can individually stop and drain and inspect
and repair tunnel number one and then eventually tunnel number two.
So the tunnel number three, Yeah, tunnel number three will
save the other two. And it's good that they're doing
it now. But I saw that it's going to be
(23:46):
fully operational in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
They think, oh wow, so we're almost there.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
Almost man.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Yeah, it's the New York's longest running municipal project, five
billion dollar price tag so far and count I guess.
And then those three tunnels or two, and however many
parts of three are working deliver one point three gallons
of water a day through a network of mainz and
(24:15):
then individual pipes leading to apartments and homes and businesses
and skyscrapers, and all of those pipes, if you total
them up, would lay out about seven thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
That's pretty impressive. I would also like to point out
that I think you meant one point three billion gallons?
Would I say one point three gallons? Yeah? Really, which
would be hilarious that they went to all this trouble,
spend all this money, and they're like, we can crank
out one three gallons a day, New York. Gather around
and get your water.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I was still thinking about my t shirt joke.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
It's a good joke.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
And here's the kicker too. Another great fact of the show.
Only five percent of all of the city's water lies
on pumps to get to its final destination, which it
means your tap.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
It's pretty awesome. Yeah, So that means that it can't
break down or if something does happen. They still have
things like gravity to help things along. It's great. So
the reason why the EPA gave New York a waiver
and said you don't have to filter the water coming
from the Catskill and the Delaware watersheds is because.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Because Giuliani greased the palms of the EPA.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Right exactly, it started well, it started out as so pure,
in pristine and just great water to begin with. But
they have taken steps along the way to ensure that
it stayed that way. Because one of the things that
happened with the Croton Reservoir is development was allowed to
grow up around it, Agriculture was allowed to pollute it.
(25:52):
It just got it turned. And after that, the EPA,
I think in the nineties the late nineties, said, yep,
you guys have to are't filtering that water. It's no
longer unfilterable. It's it's not drinkable as is, So they
had to start filtering. It used to be one hundred
percent of New York's water was unfiltered that Croton Reservoir.
(26:13):
Now is ten percent that is filtered. But so they
learned a valuable lesson from that, and now they're very
proactive and keeping the Delaware and Catskill reservoir or watershed
water from becoming corrupted by things like development and agriculture.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Yeah, and by you know, the lesson they learned is money,
because you might be thinking, like, what's the big deal,
why don't they just filter all of it. It's a
lot cheaper to take care of the land and make
sure you never have to filter it than to install
a filtering plant.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, because they estimate that a filtering plant would cost
something like ten billion dollars up front and then one
hundred million dollars a year to operate. New York is
spending something like one billion dollars every several years to
protect the Delaware the Catskill water sheds. So it is
an enormous investment. But also it's great because it's natural
(27:04):
water that's unfiltered.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Yeah. And you know, they do this in a number
of ways, aside from buying up forty percent of the land,
which was a good move and making sure nothing happens
to it.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Yep. So New York City owns a lot of land upstate.
Oh yeah to stef Yi, Yeah, forty percent. Yeah, it's
a lot of land, not forty percent of New York
State but forty percent of the property around the Catskill
and Delaware water sheds. They also did things like, hey,
let's look at all the wastewater treatment facilities upstream, and
(27:35):
let's invest a lot of money in upgrading those. Hey all,
you people that have septic tanks that are falling apart,
that matter, So we're going to reimburse you fifty two
hundred homeowners. Yeah that's impressive.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Yeah, install a new septic tank, and we're going to
pay for it.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
They remove dead trees, they replace those with little sapling
trees who apparently have roots that are young and can
abs or a lot of harmful nutrients from that rain water.
And here's another good fact of the show. Some of
the water from those reservoirs or from that watershed can
take up to a full year to make its way
(28:13):
down to the tap that you're drinking out of.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
That's a good one. I like that one. It's almost
like the how long it takes sunlight to reach us?
Speaker 1 (28:19):
And you were gonna say that it's the same thing.
It's the same thing.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
They also did you talk about farmers.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
The only difference between those stats is you don't have
to explain what a photon is you can just say water.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
It's a tiny packet of light. It's the carrier of
electromagnetic and it's right.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
What did you ask right before that?
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Did you talk about the farmers how they train farmers
upstate too? I did not, So they say, hey, you hicks,
you're gonna learn these techniques, man to I'm just kidding.
I love farmers. I would actually, as a matter of fact, Chuck,
when I retire, I really really want like a small
working farm. Oh yeah, very small, Like what do you want,
(28:59):
like a tenth of an acre? Small?
Speaker 1 (29:01):
No? No, what kind of stuff do you want to farm?
What do you want on it?
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Oh? I don't care? Yeah, oh yeah, some animals, but
just you know, having pigs around, not to eat or milk,
but to like basically but to like to churen up
like a field so that I can plan it the
next year and move the pigs to the next part
of the land. That kind of stuff. For chickens to
(29:26):
just walk around and eat their eggs and things like that.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
You want some chickens, some pigs, you want some probably
a couple of goats. A couple of goats. You want
some planting you want to farm, some plants and vegetables.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
Sure, yeah, but mainly just to have something to do,
like with the earth. So I was one hundred million
percent teasing when when I said that New York was
calling the farmers hecks. New York probably did call the
farmer's hicks. But I wasn't condoning that. I was just
making a joke.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Right, you're the guy who wants a tenth of an
acre one day to do something on that. You're not sure.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Those pigs are gonna be Like, this is some pretty
tight quarters around here. Oh you know what else? I
would do what? And I would need more of a
tenth more than a tenth of an acre for this?
Raise bees. That is where I will eventually raise bees.
It's on Josh's farm.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
Well, brother, you better get some land soon because it's leaving.
At a land is leaving, Yeah, I mean it's people
are buying land. There's I remember my parents looking at
land when I was like ten years old, and they
didn't buy it.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
They say it's leaving, and it's.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
A different deal. Now. It's a lot harder to find
the land that you want. You know, people bought it
all up.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
I know you can still get it, but you got
to pay through the nose for.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
It, yeah, or it's up to them if they want
to sell it or not. You know, sure we're getting
second rate, we're getting sloppy seconds.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Oh god, oh man, that's gonna be one of those
things that, like our younger listeners is going to be
in college smoking pot in a dorm room and it'll
just hit them what you just said, like fifteen years on.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Oh goodness. So you mentioned the croat and watershed needs
the filtering and they're trying to avoid that at all
costs with the other watersheds. But the croat and water
supply when they built this filtering system. It costs three
point two billion dollars and it's under a golf course
in New Jersey.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Which is so appropriate. That's where the tainted water is
under a golf course in Jersey and Bedminster perhaps sure,
I don't know what that is, but it sounds right.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
Oh, some people will get that one.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
New York's like, hey, you Hicks, build a golf course
over this. New York just calls everybody else Hicks. And
that's right. They do.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
When we can fly in, do they welcome Hicks?
Speaker 2 (31:39):
So have we taken our second break yet.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
No, we probably should though. This is a good time.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Okay, We're going to take another break, and we're going
to come back and explain what New York does do
to its water and whether or not it is a
secret ingredient in bagels and pizza.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
Stuff. You should know, Josh and shuck stuff. You should know, all.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Right, Chuck. So one thing that you're gonna want to say.
If you're a New Yorker and you're boasting about your
tap water, there are some things you should know. Number one,
it's chlorinated. Number two, it's been run through a UV filter.
Even if it hasn't been filtered, filtered, there's still things
that are done to it. It's not like it's coming
straight out of the cat skills into your tap.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, they take it very seriously. Obviously. Here's a good
stat In one year, there are more than fifteen thousand
water samples taken an analy at the source. So this
is upstream. They have AI, well not AI or is
it AI?
Speaker 2 (33:08):
There's AI involved somehow? There always is.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
I always ask if it's AI. Want to I always
ask you? Because you know, sure, I know. Thanks to
the end of the World with Josh Clark.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
Oh thanks for the plug.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Still available on iTunes, the iHeart podcast app or wherever
you find your podcast.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Wow, that wasn't just a plug, that was an AD.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
So they have these robotic buoys that monitor the Kensico Reservoir,
one of the reservoirs that feeds down into New York.
And these things take one point nine million measurements a
year and wirelessly transmit that back to the Department of
Environmental Protection in New York.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Yeah, which is pretty awesome. And they had a booy before,
but they had to remove it in winter because ice
would mess with it, and this new one apparently is
ice loving.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Yeah. They also if you walk down the street, there's
something like thirteen hundred, no sixty five, nine hundred and
sixty five little gray boxes that if you could open
up you would find a little sink and a faucet.
It's adorable, maybe a little sample size of loxatain soap.
(34:22):
And that's a water sampling station, it says nydep Department
of Environmental Protection, and scientists walk up to these things,
unlock them and take samples and test for all sorts
of different things to make sure that the water getting
to New York is good.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Yeah, it says more than that. It says New York
City Drinking Water Sampling Station on the front of it.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Oh wow, they really they really spell it out. Yeah,
I said Fisher free and O three stamped on.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
There, so that you know they're testing. They take thirteen
hundred water samples a month. I'm not sure if you
said that, but they were a from these particular stations
and they do all kinds of tests. Are testing obviously
for turbidity, which is cloudiness, pH chlorine, bacteria, does it
stink like all kinds of tests that they're.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Doing, right, And usually the New York City water is
going to pass all these tests like it's there's not
going to be a problem. This is just a extra
little quality assurance that they're doing because by the time
it reaches these testing stations, that's where it's going to
the taps anyway, it's tapping into the tap water basically, right,
so that ten percent of water goes through a couple
(35:35):
extra steps that is that that the other ninety percent
doesn't go through. One of the first things it does
in a treatment plan is it's mixed with alum which
is a component of aluminum, right, and alum attracts organic
compounds and basically says, rise to the surface with me,
and it creates flock, which is a white, frothy sludge,
(35:57):
and all that is just skimmed off the top.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Yeah, this sounds so gross and it is, but like
in the end, you get your good water. The next
thing that happens is it flows through these giant water filters.
Day've put it as like these giant Brita filters. It's
essentially sort of the same thing. And this is just
going to further purify the water, passing through layers and
(36:20):
layers of stuff like sand and anthracite. And then comes
the ultra violet light that you referenced earlier, right.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yes, and one hundred percent of New York's water is
sent through a UV filter because UV filters are really
good at disrupting reproduction of bacteria, and so all water
is apped. But that ninety percent of water that's not
filtered that goes through a separate UV filtering plant that's
built just for those, that's right, And that's where like
(36:49):
a billion gallons of water a day are z apped
with UV lights. But so all of that gets combined
together eventually and comes out your tap. And New Yorkers
drink it straight from the tap. Literally. It is very
bizarre because I don't know if it's a placebo effect
or what, but I feel like it does taste pretty
(37:10):
good for tap water. It does, but at the same time,
I typically don't drink just straight tapwater, so my frame
of reference isn't necessarily right there.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
You want to hear something funny, Yeah, you know what
my brother's favorite water is and what it's probably just
a bit, but he claims it's true. What hose water?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
Oh, I know what he's talking about.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
Yeah, like when you're watering the car or watering the car.
When you're washing the car, here's right, grow car when
you're watering your mini, so it grows into an suv, right.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
So I think the reason why Scott is onto something
is because when you're drinking from a hose, it's summertime
and it's hot.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
Out, yeah, and you're probably working hard.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Maybe it definitely it definitely does taste different, for sure.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
So when it comes to New York water, everyone says
it's the best in the country. There are rankings, actually,
and it is thirteen out of one hundred metro areas
in the US.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
So it's not the best literally by definition, not the
best water in the cut.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
You've got to move to Arlington, Texas if you want.
And this this was from ten years ago, but I'm
not sure what the current status is. Imagine Arlington's still
up there though.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
Sure, but you're going to have to have a lot
more reasons than that to move to Arlington, Texas. Ouch
that one, I'm not taking that.
Speaker 1 (38:27):
What are some of the problems though with New York water.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Well, there's two big problems. Turbidity, which you mentioned earlier,
which is sediment suspension in the water, which gives it
kind of a cloudy or darker, gritty kind of look,
which is it's not just that it looks bad, its
pathogens can cling to that sediment, so it's not something
you want suspended. Plus it also makes it much more
(38:51):
difficult to filter that stuff out. It's like extra work
that has to be done to get rid of that sediment.
And if you're not filtering your water to begin with,
that's kind of a problem. And then secondly, the other
one is nutrients. It's over nutrient meaning it's just packed
with ribal flavor.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Well, what it actually is is fertilizer runoff. You know,
those farmers are doing their best, but there is fertilizer
that goes downstream and runs into the watersheds, and phosphorus
is one of the biggest problems because farmers do fertilize
with phosphorus and if it runs off. The phosphorus alone
(39:33):
is not great because it can cause algae blooms and
stuff like that, and it can taste bad and stink.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Yeah, because when the algae dies, it decays and it
does not smell good.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
No, it does not smell good. But a bigger problem, though,
is when you combine that with the chlorine. Because, like
we said, New York water is chlorinated and fluoridated. We
have the T shirts to prove.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
It, right. I don't think we said it was fluoridated,
but yeah, everybody knows.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
Yeah it's fluoridated. And when you combine that chlorine with
a phosphorus, it can create byproducts called disinfection byproducts, and
that is no good at all.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
No, those are nasty. They're called d bps and they
are basically like chemicals that are accidentally made from sanitizing water.
And not just with chlorine, but chlorine chlorine. There's a
bunch of different stuff that they use to disinfect water,
and all of them can combine with organic compounds to
(40:32):
create really just nasty stuff like carcinages or carcinogens. Some
can produce miscarriages. It's just really really bad stuff that
can be produced in the drinking water.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Chloroform is one of those byproducts.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Yeah, which is why New Yorkers frequently faint when they're
drinking tapwater.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
But this all sounds super scary New York City. They are.
They have I think there are eight to known contaminants,
but they are still apparently well under the legal limit,
depending on what you think about how the legal limits
are set.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Up for it, right, exactly, it's a good caveat.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
But New York City drinking water is thirty point nine
parts per billion chloroform and the national average is eleven.
So they're way higher on chloroform. But as far as
all of those DBPs total, they're far below the legal
limit and just a little bit above average nationally.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Right, And then the total number of DBPs that they
have is actually less than those in Arlington.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
So interesting.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Chew on that Arlington.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
That's right, Chew on that bad pizza.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Speaking of chewing, Chuck and pizza. Let's just answer this question.
Is New York City's water the key ingredient to New
York City bagels and pizza? H?
Speaker 1 (41:49):
I think, I mean, you can't definitively say, but I
think it does have something to do with it. For sure.
Speaker 2 (41:54):
It's got to because science is involved. So here's the thing.
The water from the Catskills and from the Delaware is
naturally soft, meaning that it's lowing calcium and magnesium. Where
do you fall on loving softer hard water? I'm a
hard water guy, same here man.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
When I lived in Arizona, they had soft water where
I lived in my sister's house that I lived in,
and most of the houses had water softening or I
guess hardening units or whatever in the house.
Speaker 2 (42:26):
Yeah, because you can't feel clean, like you never feel
like you got the shampoo or the soap off. It's awful.
It's just awful.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Does anyone like soft water?
Speaker 2 (42:35):
I don't know, weirdo's probably.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
I mean hard water. Sorry, no, I had it all backwards.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Okay, So so you like soft water.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
Yeah, that's why I actually, that's why I misspoke. They
had water softeners in Arizona because the water was hard
New York water is soft.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
I like soft, Okay, I like hard water typically because
I feel like I'm clean afterward. But water like just
the New York water is fine with me. But a
softened like a chemically softened water, I can't stand.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Oh really, yes, interesting.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
But New York's is naturally soft, so it doesn't have calcium, magnesium,
or it's very low in those things comparatively, and that
actually has an effect on taste, like calcium and magnesium
can provide like a bitter taste to water. So there's
one thing that they're saying, like, Okay, the dough isn't
going to taste naturally bitter because of the calcium magnesium.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
That's something that is something, and it also interacts with
the flour. If you're going to make a bagel or
a biali or pizza crust, sure you can be or
you know a lot of things when you're baking, but
those are the big three. In New York. You're going
to be using flour and water as your base for
your dough and hard water. The minerals in those tapwater
(43:51):
are going to fortify the gluten and they're going to
make it tough and less flexible. You don't want it
too soft, though, because it'll have the opposite effect. It
will be gooey and you won't be able to work
it as well. Right, And apparently the American Chemical Society
says New York City tap water is the Goldilocks of
bagel water.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
It is just right yep, not too hard, not too soft,
just perfect for a begel and for a pizza. And
that that American Chemical Society quote came from a Smithsonian
article and they went on to say, probably though, it's
actually the techniques that New Yorkers use to make bagels.
Like they poach the bagel dough first, like they boil it.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
That's the only way to do a bagel. Sure it's boiled,
it's not a bagel.
Speaker 2 (44:31):
No it's not.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
It's like a bake donut. It's not a donut basically.
Speaker 2 (44:35):
And then they also will they'll let the yeast sit
for a little while to make it for mint, which
creates volatile flavor compounds, so it just tastes better. They're saying,
probably those are the reasons why New Yorkers make better
bagels or pizza. And it's not really the water. The
water just contributes a very small amount.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
I think it's all those things.
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Why not? No one can say for certain, so let's
just say yes, it is exactly things. Well, if you
want to know more about New York City's tap water,
go on to New York City and try their tap water.
And since I said that it's time for listener mail everybody.
Speaker 1 (45:16):
I'm gonna call this house rolling. And we talked about
tepeing houses. Yep, love the podcast. Guys, just finish up
trick or treating, and you were talking about rolling houses.
I grew up in Franklin, Tennessee, where we used to
roll houses all the time. In Franklin, Tennessee, for people
don't know, is where a lot of big shot Nashville
(45:37):
big wigs live because you can buy a huge house
with lots of land. That was Chuck speaking right. Funny
thing though, guys, I'm back to being Brandon. Okay, funny
thing though, guys. My neighbor was Brad Paisley. There was
a couple of years before his first Grammy award. And
once we found this out, we knew that we had
to get them. So my sister and I gathered all
(45:57):
of our friends dressed in black and snow out to
roll this country. Music Stars house. We were halfway through
the job when his freaking tour bus rolled up on us.
At first, we all ran away frightened, but we were
pretty much caught in the act. Nowhere to go. He
got off the bus and was super nice about the
whole thing. Actually, he gave us a quick tour of
the tour bus, chatted us up for a little while.
(46:19):
We even cleaned up the little bit of mess we
had made, and left starstruck. I highly doubt he remembers
that night at all, but my friends and I will
certainly never forget anyway. That's all I got. Guys, have
a spooky Halloween. That is from Brandon Saunders.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
That is very nice. Brandon, thanks a lot for that email,
and hats off to Brad Paisley for being so cool.
Speaker 1 (46:39):
He doesn't take his hat off, but.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
All right, exactly, but also how about just a hat
tip then?
Speaker 1 (46:44):
Yeah? Or actually I was thinking Kenny Chesney because he's bald.
Speaker 2 (46:47):
None of those guys take their hats off, dude. So
but also he hangs out with Peyton Manning, which means
that he must be a good guy. Right, Oh yeah,
isn't Peyton a good dude?
Speaker 1 (46:56):
Sure? I'm just tired of seeing him on my TV.
Speaker 2 (46:59):
Oh that's not gonna app anytime soon. Pretty soon you'll
see them in augmented reality, and you're going to say
everywhere you go, like it or not, Charles. Okay, Well,
if you want to get in touch with this, like
Brad Paisley did, you can go on to stuff youshould
Know dot com and check out our social links, and
you can also send us a good old fashioned email,
wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, with it
(47:21):
some good old country goodness, and send it off to
stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Hell to everybody. I hope you're having a lovely Saturday
wherever you are in the world. Chuck, here with a
Saturday Select selection, and I'm going to go with from
November twenty nineteen, not even so long ago, as the
Crow Flies. The episode is NYC Water Colon an Engineering Marvel.
(00:21):
I love New York City. Everyone knows that I go
on and on about that city on the show, and
I'm constantly amazed that city runs, and that the trash
gets taken away and the mail gets delivered, and that
people have enough drinking water and water to bathe in
and cook with. And so it's a pretty unique situation
(00:45):
there in New York how they get their water. And
here's that story. Please to enjoy. Welcome to Stuff You
Should Know, a production of iHeartRadio.
Speaker 2 (01:03):
Hey, and welcome to the podcast. I'm Josh Clark. There's
Charles so B, Chuck Bryant, there's guest producer Andrew. This
is Stuff you should Know. Let's get this a.
Speaker 1 (01:14):
I'm excited about this one.
Speaker 2 (01:16):
This was your pick and I was like, what is
Chuck talking about? Were you really yes? And then Chuck,
I happened to stumble upon I don't know what I
was looking for, but an email from somebody who sent
like a Google doc or something that was a list
of episodes we said we should do, and people have
(01:39):
set those in before, but this one was kind of
condensed and that was on there. So I've stumbled upon
your dirty little secret.
Speaker 1 (01:46):
I don't think that's where I got it. Oh really,
I don't think so, but maybe Okay, I just know
that I am always fascinated by not only New York City,
but by the fact that New York City functions with
that many people and all that everything. It's just all
amazing to me that that city functions with that many people,
(02:09):
that many buildings, that like, I want to do an
episode on out trash removal.
Speaker 2 (02:13):
Okay, I want to do one on the mail on
wastewater treatment. Yeah, oh yeah, that's just New York in general.
Speaker 1 (02:20):
That's been long brewing.
Speaker 2 (02:22):
Are you okay with that?
Speaker 1 (02:23):
Yeah?
Speaker 2 (02:24):
Just I mean, we can mention New York or whatever.
Speaker 1 (02:28):
Big thanks to Dave Ruse though, one of our great writers.
They put this together and it's really really fascinating.
Speaker 2 (02:34):
Dave's just an amazing human. All of our writers are amazing,
for sure. Dave is great as well. He's one of
a few select amazing people.
Speaker 1 (02:43):
Right.
Speaker 2 (02:44):
So the reason why New York, why anybody would ask
about New York's water is because if you've ever interacted
with the New Yorker, they talk about their water a lot.
It's like kind of a thing in New York where
they're like, our tap water is the best water in
the country, and they have like a lot of stuff
to back that up with, and so much so that
(03:06):
that they say this, this water is actually the reason
why our bagels and our pizza are so good.
Speaker 1 (03:13):
Yeah, I was. We were both just there for our
final shows of the year at the Bellhouse thanks to
people who came out. Yes, they were great, a lot
of fun. And by the way, the guy that fell
asleep on the front row on night number two, I
think it was night number two. I was walking down
the street and he randomly passed by driving in a
(03:33):
car and rolled down his window and said, hey man,
He said great show the other night.
Speaker 2 (03:40):
Right, And I was waiting for him to say, is
that Freedom Rock?
Speaker 1 (03:43):
And I said thanks dude, I was like front row
And he was so excited that I remembered that, and
he said front row and he drove on before I
had a chance to say you fell asleep.
Speaker 2 (03:54):
He's like, I feel like I was there. Maybe I
felt like a dream too.
Speaker 1 (03:58):
I don't know, but we were just there. And there
are many many restaurants in New York where there will
be like a water cooler or a place where you
can help yourself to your own cup of water, and
it will have a big sign on it that says
New York City tap water and proud all caps underlined letters.
Speaker 2 (04:19):
Yeah, And they mean like they're just getting water out
of the tap, Whereas in other cities that's a dirty,
shameful secret that people don't talk about.
Speaker 1 (04:27):
That's right.
Speaker 2 (04:27):
In New York, they proudly boast about it. And just
the fact that New York or any New Yorker in
the city gets water at all is pretty spectacular. It's
like you said, there's a lot of people, there's a
lot of buildings, and something like more than a billion
gallons of water flow into New York through the taps
(04:49):
every day.
Speaker 1 (04:50):
Yeah, I said day with the d yes. It is
the largest water system in the United States. People from
all over the world, government officials fly in and take
meetings with the New York City water people just to see,
like how have you done it?
Speaker 2 (05:10):
They're just agog, how could we do better? So that's
impressive enough that a billion, more than a billion gallons
of water is delivered every day to New Yorkers. Pretty great.
But the idea that you can just drink it straight
from the tap and it is ninety percent unfiltered, yeah,
that is a truly impressive feat.
Speaker 1 (05:31):
Yeah. And by ninety percent unfiltered, we mean ninety percent
of the water is unfiltered and ten percent is filtered.
Speaker 2 (05:39):
Right, And you might say, look, how can you just
filter ninety percent of the water. Well, it comes from
different places, that's right. So ninety percent of the water
comes from two places, two watersheds that combined are called
the Catskill Delaware Watershed or water system I think. And
then the other one from the Crow Croton I always
want to say Crow toWin. Yeah, but from the Croton Reservoir.
(06:01):
That ten percent is actually filtered. We'll get into all
of that. But ninety percent of New York's water is not.
It doesn't go through a filtering process. And that makes
New York one of only five major cities in the
United States to get a waiver from the EPA that
says your water is so deliciously pure and delightful that
(06:22):
you don't need to filter it. Almost every other city
has to have a filtering process before it gets delivered
to taps.
Speaker 1 (06:29):
That's right. And the other four naturally Seattle, Portland, Oregon,
San Francisco. The one that's a bit of a surprise
is Boston, Massachusetts.
Speaker 2 (06:38):
What's that's how surprising it is, Chuck, Yeah, that's right.
Speaker 1 (06:45):
So let's talk a little bit about the history of
New York and their water, because back in the day,
we've always talked about how what a disgusting, disease ridden
poop and horse urine ridden place New York City was.
Speaker 2 (06:59):
Yeah, supposedly there's a good twelve inches of horse manure
on the street at all times. They before they really
started cleaning their place up.
Speaker 1 (07:08):
Yeah, it's pretty bad.
Speaker 2 (07:09):
I think that was in the wind Criest Typhoid Marry episode,
which is a great.
Speaker 1 (07:13):
One, another great New York episode. So if we're talking
New Amsterdam, pre New York City, they got water where
you would think from ponds and natural springs, underwater springs,
and they had a forty eight acre pond it's about
sixty feet deep in Tribeca. What is now Tribeca called
the Collect and also the little Collect that was just
(07:36):
south of there, And that name comes from the Dutch
word caulk, which means small body of water. And the
Collect was where they got their water for a long
time until the city let some tanners built a tannery
on the shores of the Collect, not smart New York,
which ruined everything.
Speaker 2 (07:57):
Yeah, because it started to get polluted. They all were
able to drill wells and stuff around places where people
pooped and peed and then dump their poop and pee.
It was a dirty, dirty place because this is pre
germ theory, or at least around the time the germ
theory was being developed and people didn't understand it. And
I think it was our great stink episode where they
(08:19):
traced a colera epidemic to a public well, a public
water pump. John Snow, if I remember correctly did that.
And this would have been around the time that New
Yorkers were suffering from cholera epidemics, one of which took
place in I think the eighteen thirties, eighteen thirty two.
It killed thirty five hundred New Yorkers and that was
a substantial amount of the population at the time, and
(08:43):
another one hundred thousand New Yorkers had to flee just
to get away from this colera epidemic, and it was
because their sewage and their water was coexisting in very
unhealthy ways. So New York said, maybe we should try
something else. Let's look a little further outside the city
where we're dumping our waists and everything. See if we
can get our water from there.
Speaker 1 (09:03):
And they did.
Speaker 2 (09:04):
They built the Croton Reservoir. They damned the river, and
reservoir collected and they said, now we have some beautiful
pure water. We will never need to do anything again
to get our water.
Speaker 1 (09:15):
That's right. Previous to that, though, in the eighteenth century,
they had these public pumps like you were talking about
on street corners, about every four blocks or so, a
big wooden pump where you would get your water from
underground streams and springs and stuff. But there were only
a few of these that actually delivered good water. A
(09:35):
lot of it was really brackish and gross tasting, and
Americans and early European settlers obviously loved their tea, and
so they marked this was almost like an early yelp
or whatever. They had these pumps that actually delivered like
the two or three good pumps in the city that
delivered good water labeled tea water.
Speaker 2 (09:54):
Pumps, but like it was good enough to use for tea.
Speaker 1 (09:56):
Good enough to use for making good tea, okay, so
they would go to these tea water pumps. You would
have to buy the water. The best one was apparently
at Chathaman Roosevelt. There was another and sort of what
the Lower east Side is today that was a good
tea water pump. And this worked out for a long
time until the collect and all this stuff. It started
(10:19):
to sort of get nasty and stinky, and so they
built a canal to channel that water into the river.
Like that, we got to get rid of it and
drain this thing. So they build this canal forty feet wide,
they channel it. Right after they finish it, this canal
begins to sink, and in eighteen twenty one it got
so bad. The smell was so bad that they eventually
(10:41):
just covered up the canal. And guess what that became.
Speaker 2 (10:46):
I don't know, Central Park Canal Street. Oh, how about
that so stupid? I wasn't even in the right part
of the city.
Speaker 1 (10:55):
That's all right.
Speaker 2 (10:56):
We've even done an episode on Central Park and that
wouldn't it forget it? Yes, Canal Street obviously.
Speaker 1 (11:01):
That's where Canal Street came from. That was literally a
canal and then eventually an underground sewage system under running
under Canal Street. Right, And there's another cool little tidbit
if you want like your little New York history, if
you like to walk around on subways and tell people
about cool things. Yeah, one of the first public reservoirs
in the city was dug by Aaron Burr and his
(11:22):
Manhattan Company, and that didn't work out. They transported it
through wooden logs as pipes bury beneath the city.
Speaker 2 (11:29):
Somebody found a piece of that wooden log. It's in
one of the museums up there. Now, Oh no way, Yeah.
Speaker 1 (11:35):
That is very cool. But the water didn't taste great
and it didn't work out for Aaron Burr, so he changed.
He still kept the Manhattan Company, but he got into
banking and the Manhattan Company became Chase Manhattan Bank.
Speaker 2 (11:48):
I saw somewhere that that was his aim all along,
that the water thing was just basically a fleece to
raise money to found oh really, and that that's why
the water was so shoddy and the delivery was so shoddy.
But what they were selling was so bad supposedly the
horses wouldn't even drink.
Speaker 1 (12:05):
It, So it's a scam.
Speaker 2 (12:06):
It was basically a scam. Aaron Burr was not the
greatest historical American shot Alexander Hamilton.
Speaker 1 (12:14):
I know that's enough right there, right.
Speaker 2 (12:16):
And then also scammed a bunch of people out of
their water investment. That's right, because I mean, if you
want to invest in a bank, you want to invest
in a bank. If you want to invest in a
water outfit, you want to invest in a water outfit.
You want people to be above the boards with stuff
like that.
Speaker 1 (12:32):
That's right above the dogs.
Speaker 2 (12:34):
That's my tirade.
Speaker 1 (12:36):
So you mentioned the Croton Dam and the Croton Reservoir.
I want to say crow atone as well. Yeah, that
became and that aqueduct became operational and things were okay,
but then a tragedy struck with the Great Fire of
eighteen thirty.
Speaker 2 (12:51):
Five, Yes, which actually I guess that the Great Fire
took place right before the reservoir was opened, which is
why the greats are bad. Yeah. So in eighteen thirty five,
on a night in December, a warehouse caught fire and
it just leveled Lower Manhattan, like just destroyed something like
(13:11):
seventeen city blocks, fifty acres of the most densely populated
part of New York at the time, and luckily only
two people died. Was too many, but considering that it
was seventeen city blocks that got reduced to ash, that's
not bad actually, especially considering that the way that they
(13:32):
ended up fighting this fire was by setting buildings on
the perimeter on fire because they didn't have the amount
of water that they needed.
Speaker 1 (13:40):
Yeah, the reason for that it was just sort of
really bad luck. They were two smaller fires that drained
our hour. Like I'm a New Yorker, listen to.
Speaker 2 (13:49):
Me, you're an honorary New Yorker, I would guess.
Speaker 1 (13:51):
It drained the cisterns, the reserve cisterns that they had,
and because of those two smaller fires, they didn't have
enough to fight the Great Fire. And the long and
short of all this, as New York said, we got
to really speed up this Croton Reservoir work.
Speaker 2 (14:04):
Yep, and they did. And so the Croton Reservoir was
broad online in the middle of the nineteenth century, and
they had a big old parade and everything, and it
delivered something like ninety million gallons of delicious pure water
to New York in the middle of the nineteenth century.
It was a really big deal and it worked really
(14:26):
well for a very long time. But there was also
they built the murray Hill Reservoir so the Croton Reservoir
would be where the water collected upstate. And then they
built an aqueduct system which is still around in parts today,
an elevated aqueduct to what's called the murray Hill Reservoir,
which was a four acre above ground swimming pool.
Speaker 1 (14:48):
Basically, it's pretty cool if you look at pictures.
Speaker 2 (14:50):
Yeah, Yeah, it was like a real spot in the
city while it was around, I think something till eighteen
forty two to nineteen hu it was around, and people
used to take strolls around it and make paintings of
it and that kind of thing. And it is where
the New York Public Library is now today, where the
Ghostbusters did some of their early work. All right, right,
(15:12):
but it worked really well for you know, the time.
But then as New York grew and grew and grew,
it became very painfully obvious yet again that New York
had outgrown its water supply.
Speaker 1 (15:24):
Yeah, they needed more water. Ninety million gallons a day
wasn't enough. And then what made matters worse was in
eighteen ninety eight, New York City officially made it a
declaration that we are now not just Lower Manhattan. Of course,
they didn't call Lower Manhattan at the time, right, that
was just sort of where the city ended.
Speaker 2 (15:44):
They called it Manahattan.
Speaker 1 (15:45):
Yeah, Manhattan.
Speaker 2 (15:46):
I saw that episode, by the way, it was one
of the better ones ever, which one think of what
we do in the dark. Oh, that's right, where they
go to party in Manhattan Manahattan.
Speaker 1 (15:57):
Yea, what we do in the shadows? Yeah, yeah, yeah, yeah,
I'm so stupid, that's all right. The Five Burrows were
included in eighteen nine to eight officially, so New York
and the water needed to get to the people was
officially grown to more than three million people by the
time the twentieth century turned.
Speaker 2 (16:18):
Right, which is just precious today. Three million New Yorkers,
Oh my gosh, I really do. So they started to
look upstate again because they had hit upon like a
pretty good idea. The city is a cesspool. We need
our water from outside of this cesspool. And they started
looking up state. So this time they looked up to
the cat Skills and they found two watersheds, which we
(16:39):
did an episode on watersheds that I would love to forget,
but it came up just now.
Speaker 1 (16:43):
Oh I thought it was good.
Speaker 2 (16:44):
No, oh man, it was horrendous, was it? Yes? I
thought it was terrible and boring.
Speaker 1 (16:49):
January twenty seventeen.
Speaker 2 (16:51):
I don't remember when it came out. Like I said,
I tried to forget that it ever happened.
Speaker 1 (16:54):
I thought it was pretty good.
Speaker 2 (16:55):
But anyway, So a watershed is basically a specific topographical
air area where rain, snow, whatever precipitation falls down into
this area and is delivered to a specific creek, river stream,
something like that that eventually empties into like a lake
or reservoir or something like that. So there's two watersheds,
(17:18):
the Delaware and the Catskill Watershed that put together create
something like two thousand square miles of water catching goodness,
and it delivers it to a number of different reservoirs.
And that is now today where New York gets like
ninety percent of its water.
Speaker 1 (17:35):
Yeah, so you know, obviously they had to dam up
rivers to create these reservoirs, and this all happened to
you in the early nineteen hundreds. And then finally they
were like, great, We've got all these reservoirs and the Catskills,
but let me remind you, we're on the lower east
side of Manhattan, surrounded by horse hearin and a lot
of it and poop. We need our fresh water. How
(17:57):
do we get it here? So in nineteen seventeen, the
engineers of New York City completed the ninety two mile
Catskill Aqueduct YEP, which is amazing. It's basically a big
concrete tunnel that sends water ninety two miles from the
Catskills down to New York. It's as wide as thirty
(18:19):
feet in some places. It is not a tunnel the
entire length, as we will see here in a minute.
Not a continuous tunnel. I'm not sure what that means.
What is it just like open.
Speaker 2 (18:31):
There's parts of it that aren't technically a tunnel in
that it's a covered trench. Okay, they cut a trench
and then they covered it back up, which I don't
know how you do that. But it's not technically a
tunnel like a circle or tube.
Speaker 1 (18:44):
Interesting, and here is to me one of the facts
of the show. You get this water down there in
the aqueduct and you get to the Hudson River, and
what are you gonna do? You gotta go under it.
Speaker 2 (18:54):
Right to me, it'd just be like just pump it
in the Hudson and hope it comes out the other side.
But then I would have gotten fired immediately when night
he's no engineer. No, he's a sham.
Speaker 1 (19:06):
He's a rapscallion. So it gets to the Hudson River
and then it goes way down into the ground, about
eleven hundred feet below sea level, and then climbs back
up the other side. And it does all this via gravity.
Speaker 2 (19:22):
Yes, and they did that not just to show off,
but because they decided. I read this awesome, you know
how I'm always like read the contemporary articles. I read
one from nineteen oh seven where they were talking about
the construction of the aqueduct and they said that the
reason why they were going down that far is because
they wanted to hit bedrock because it would be fissure free,
(19:44):
meaning there would be no leakage, and they could just
pump the water through the hole that they bored in
the bedrock. Well, they thought the bedrock was going to
be about five hundred feet down, and by nineteen oh
seven when they wrote the Scientific American article, they'd reached
like seven hundred feet still hadn't hit it. It ended
up being like eleven hundred feet below sea level where
they finally hit bedrock. And that's why they had to
(20:05):
drill so far down. And they drilled a tunnel, a
vertical shaft from the from the Hudson down to that tunnel,
and they built like a tube to pressurize it. So
the water eleven hundred feet under the Hudson is at
like fifteen tons per square foot of pressure, which also helps.
(20:26):
But the fact that there's no pumps or anything, it's
all gravity and pressure driven.
Speaker 1 (20:30):
Yes, And sadly though, that story has a sad ending
because it took so long that their fissure free and
three T shirts were all rendered useless.
Speaker 2 (20:42):
What No, I don't know that it's a great joke.
I'm gonna go back and listen to it and I'll
probably think it's hilarious, So compliments on it in advance.
Speaker 1 (20:56):
Oh man, that was a quality joke.
Speaker 2 (20:59):
Three gotcha? Okay, sure, sure, yeah, yeah, yeah, I gotcha,
All right, I got you. We're all together. Now, Okay,
that is a pretty good joke.
Speaker 1 (21:08):
Gee. Should we take a break after that? Yeah, all right,
let's take a break. We'll talk a little bit more
about this so called aqueduct right after this.
Speaker 3 (21:33):
Stuff you should know, Josh, and shuck stuff you should know.
Speaker 2 (21:54):
Okay, Chuck. So we've got the Catskill Aqueduct delivering water.
There's another one in two called the Delaware Aqueduct. And
this one actually is like a genuine tunnel.
Speaker 1 (22:06):
Yes, it's eighty five miles, completed in forty four. I'm
not gonna make a T shirt joke about that. And
it is still the longest continuous tunnel in the world
at eighty five miles. And they did this all, you know,
just this digging process is amazing in and of itself,
digging these tunnels and these trenches with steam shovels and
(22:30):
pouring the concrete tunnel, which I was like, how do
you do that? Even, Yeah, you do the bottom half
let it set, and then you do the top half
and let that set. So they were like Charles Bronson
in The Great Escape. They were digging tunnels.
Speaker 2 (22:43):
Yeah, I mean we're talking like dynamite and stuff like that.
Like they really did it the old school way to
build these aqueducts, and they're still in use today, so
much so that there's three tunnels. Tunnel number one and
tunnel number two have been in operation since nineteen seventeen
and nineteen thirty six. They've never stopped operating. They've never
been stopped up and drained and inspected in over one
(23:07):
hundred years. For tunnel number one.
Speaker 1 (23:09):
Yeah, I think the current memo going around is I'm
sure it's fine.
Speaker 2 (23:13):
Well, so they're building tunnel number three, and they decided
to start building tunnel number three nineteen fifty four. They
actually started in nineteen seventy. They are still not done
with tunnel number three.
Speaker 1 (23:24):
It's amazing.
Speaker 2 (23:25):
Parts of it are online. And when it does fully
come online, tunnel number three will have a capacity enough
so that they can individually stop and drain and inspect
and repair tunnel number one and then eventually tunnel number two.
So the tunnel number three, Yeah, tunnel number three will
save the other two. And it's good that they're doing
it now. But I saw that it's going to be
(23:46):
fully operational in twenty twenty one.
Speaker 1 (23:48):
They think, oh wow, so we're almost there.
Speaker 2 (23:51):
Almost man.
Speaker 1 (23:52):
Yeah, it's the New York's longest running municipal project, five
billion dollar price tag so far and count I guess.
And then those three tunnels or two, and however many
parts of three are working deliver one point three gallons
of water a day through a network of mainz and
(24:15):
then individual pipes leading to apartments and homes and businesses
and skyscrapers, and all of those pipes, if you total
them up, would lay out about seven thousand miles.
Speaker 2 (24:29):
That's pretty impressive. I would also like to point out
that I think you meant one point three billion gallons?
Would I say one point three gallons? Yeah? Really, which
would be hilarious that they went to all this trouble,
spend all this money, and they're like, we can crank
out one three gallons a day, New York. Gather around
and get your water.
Speaker 1 (24:50):
I was still thinking about my t shirt joke.
Speaker 2 (24:53):
It's a good joke.
Speaker 1 (24:54):
And here's the kicker too. Another great fact of the show.
Only five percent of all of the city's water lies
on pumps to get to its final destination, which it
means your tap.
Speaker 2 (25:05):
It's pretty awesome. Yeah, So that means that it can't
break down or if something does happen. They still have
things like gravity to help things along. It's great. So
the reason why the EPA gave New York a waiver
and said you don't have to filter the water coming
from the Catskill and the Delaware watersheds is because.
Speaker 1 (25:27):
Because Giuliani greased the palms of the EPA.
Speaker 2 (25:30):
Right exactly, it started well, it started out as so pure,
in pristine and just great water to begin with. But
they have taken steps along the way to ensure that
it stayed that way. Because one of the things that
happened with the Croton Reservoir is development was allowed to
grow up around it, Agriculture was allowed to pollute it.
(25:52):
It just got it turned. And after that, the EPA,
I think in the nineties the late nineties, said, yep,
you guys have to are't filtering that water. It's no
longer unfilterable. It's it's not drinkable as is, So they
had to start filtering. It used to be one hundred
percent of New York's water was unfiltered that Croton Reservoir.
(26:13):
Now is ten percent that is filtered. But so they
learned a valuable lesson from that, and now they're very
proactive and keeping the Delaware and Catskill reservoir or watershed
water from becoming corrupted by things like development and agriculture.
Speaker 1 (26:31):
Yeah, and by you know, the lesson they learned is money,
because you might be thinking, like, what's the big deal,
why don't they just filter all of it. It's a
lot cheaper to take care of the land and make
sure you never have to filter it than to install
a filtering plant.
Speaker 2 (26:44):
Yeah, because they estimate that a filtering plant would cost
something like ten billion dollars up front and then one
hundred million dollars a year to operate. New York is
spending something like one billion dollars every several years to
protect the Delaware the Catskill water sheds. So it is
an enormous investment. But also it's great because it's natural
(27:04):
water that's unfiltered.
Speaker 1 (27:06):
Yeah. And you know, they do this in a number
of ways, aside from buying up forty percent of the land,
which was a good move and making sure nothing happens
to it.
Speaker 2 (27:15):
Yep. So New York City owns a lot of land upstate.
Oh yeah to stef Yi, Yeah, forty percent. Yeah, it's
a lot of land, not forty percent of New York
State but forty percent of the property around the Catskill
and Delaware water sheds. They also did things like, hey,
let's look at all the wastewater treatment facilities upstream, and
(27:35):
let's invest a lot of money in upgrading those. Hey all,
you people that have septic tanks that are falling apart,
that matter, So we're going to reimburse you fifty two
hundred homeowners. Yeah that's impressive.
Speaker 1 (27:48):
Yeah, install a new septic tank, and we're going to
pay for it.
Speaker 2 (27:50):
Yep.
Speaker 1 (27:51):
They remove dead trees, they replace those with little sapling
trees who apparently have roots that are young and can
abs or a lot of harmful nutrients from that rain water.
And here's another good fact of the show. Some of
the water from those reservoirs or from that watershed can
take up to a full year to make its way
(28:13):
down to the tap that you're drinking out of.
Speaker 2 (28:15):
That's a good one. I like that one. It's almost
like the how long it takes sunlight to reach us?
Speaker 1 (28:19):
And you were gonna say that it's the same thing.
It's the same thing.
Speaker 2 (28:22):
They also did you talk about farmers.
Speaker 1 (28:25):
The only difference between those stats is you don't have
to explain what a photon is you can just say water.
Speaker 2 (28:30):
It's a tiny packet of light. It's the carrier of
electromagnetic and it's right.
Speaker 1 (28:36):
What did you ask right before that?
Speaker 2 (28:37):
Did you talk about the farmers how they train farmers
upstate too? I did not, So they say, hey, you hicks,
you're gonna learn these techniques, man to I'm just kidding.
I love farmers. I would actually, as a matter of fact, Chuck,
when I retire, I really really want like a small
working farm. Oh yeah, very small, Like what do you want,
(28:59):
like a tenth of an acre? Small?
Speaker 1 (29:01):
No? No, what kind of stuff do you want to farm?
What do you want on it?
Speaker 2 (29:04):
Oh? I don't care? Yeah, oh yeah, some animals, but
just you know, having pigs around, not to eat or milk,
but to like basically but to like to churen up
like a field so that I can plan it the
next year and move the pigs to the next part
of the land. That kind of stuff. For chickens to
(29:26):
just walk around and eat their eggs and things like that.
Speaker 1 (29:28):
You want some chickens, some pigs, you want some probably
a couple of goats. A couple of goats. You want
some planting you want to farm, some plants and vegetables.
Speaker 2 (29:36):
Sure, yeah, but mainly just to have something to do,
like with the earth. So I was one hundred million
percent teasing when when I said that New York was
calling the farmers hecks. New York probably did call the
farmer's hicks. But I wasn't condoning that. I was just
making a joke.
Speaker 1 (29:52):
Right, you're the guy who wants a tenth of an
acre one day to do something on that. You're not sure.
Speaker 2 (29:56):
Those pigs are gonna be Like, this is some pretty
tight quarters around here. Oh you know what else? I
would do what? And I would need more of a
tenth more than a tenth of an acre for this?
Raise bees. That is where I will eventually raise bees.
It's on Josh's farm.
Speaker 1 (30:08):
Well, brother, you better get some land soon because it's leaving.
At a land is leaving, Yeah, I mean it's people
are buying land. There's I remember my parents looking at
land when I was like ten years old, and they
didn't buy it.
Speaker 2 (30:25):
They say it's leaving, and it's.
Speaker 1 (30:26):
A different deal. Now. It's a lot harder to find
the land that you want. You know, people bought it
all up.
Speaker 2 (30:32):
I know you can still get it, but you got
to pay through the nose for.
Speaker 1 (30:35):
It, yeah, or it's up to them if they want
to sell it or not. You know, sure we're getting
second rate, we're getting sloppy seconds.
Speaker 2 (30:42):
Oh god, oh man, that's gonna be one of those
things that, like our younger listeners is going to be
in college smoking pot in a dorm room and it'll
just hit them what you just said, like fifteen years on.
Speaker 1 (30:53):
Oh goodness. So you mentioned the croat and watershed needs
the filtering and they're trying to avoid that at all
costs with the other watersheds. But the croat and water
supply when they built this filtering system. It costs three
point two billion dollars and it's under a golf course
in New Jersey.
Speaker 2 (31:14):
Which is so appropriate. That's where the tainted water is
under a golf course in Jersey and Bedminster perhaps sure,
I don't know what that is, but it sounds right.
Speaker 1 (31:24):
Oh, some people will get that one.
Speaker 2 (31:27):
New York's like, hey, you Hicks, build a golf course
over this. New York just calls everybody else Hicks. And
that's right. They do.
Speaker 1 (31:35):
When we can fly in, do they welcome Hicks?
Speaker 2 (31:39):
So have we taken our second break yet.
Speaker 1 (31:42):
No, we probably should though. This is a good time.
Speaker 2 (31:44):
Okay, We're going to take another break, and we're going
to come back and explain what New York does do
to its water and whether or not it is a
secret ingredient in bagels and pizza.
Speaker 3 (32:11):
Stuff. You should know, Josh and shuck stuff. You should know, all.
Speaker 2 (32:32):
Right, Chuck. So one thing that you're gonna want to say.
If you're a New Yorker and you're boasting about your
tap water, there are some things you should know. Number one,
it's chlorinated. Number two, it's been run through a UV filter.
Even if it hasn't been filtered, filtered, there's still things
that are done to it. It's not like it's coming
straight out of the cat skills into your tap.
Speaker 1 (32:51):
Yeah, they take it very seriously. Obviously. Here's a good
stat In one year, there are more than fifteen thousand
water samples taken an analy at the source. So this
is upstream. They have AI, well not AI or is
it AI?
Speaker 2 (33:08):
There's AI involved somehow? There always is.
Speaker 1 (33:11):
I always ask if it's AI. Want to I always
ask you? Because you know, sure, I know. Thanks to
the end of the World with Josh Clark.
Speaker 2 (33:17):
Oh thanks for the plug.
Speaker 1 (33:19):
Still available on iTunes, the iHeart podcast app or wherever
you find your podcast.
Speaker 2 (33:25):
Wow, that wasn't just a plug, that was an AD.
Speaker 1 (33:28):
So they have these robotic buoys that monitor the Kensico Reservoir,
one of the reservoirs that feeds down into New York.
And these things take one point nine million measurements a
year and wirelessly transmit that back to the Department of
Environmental Protection in New York.
Speaker 2 (33:48):
Yeah, which is pretty awesome. And they had a booy before,
but they had to remove it in winter because ice
would mess with it, and this new one apparently is
ice loving.
Speaker 1 (33:59):
Yeah, yeah.
Speaker 2 (34:00):
Yeah. They also if you walk down the street, there's
something like thirteen hundred, no sixty five, nine hundred and
sixty five little gray boxes that if you could open
up you would find a little sink and a faucet.
It's adorable, maybe a little sample size of loxatain soap.
(34:22):
And that's a water sampling station, it says nydep Department
of Environmental Protection, and scientists walk up to these things,
unlock them and take samples and test for all sorts
of different things to make sure that the water getting
to New York is good.
Speaker 1 (34:39):
Yeah, it says more than that. It says New York
City Drinking Water Sampling Station on the front of it.
Speaker 2 (34:45):
Oh wow, they really they really spell it out. Yeah,
I said Fisher free and O three stamped on.
Speaker 1 (34:51):
There, so that you know they're testing. They take thirteen
hundred water samples a month. I'm not sure if you
said that, but they were a from these particular stations
and they do all kinds of tests. Are testing obviously
for turbidity, which is cloudiness, pH chlorine, bacteria, does it
stink like all kinds of tests that they're.
Speaker 2 (35:12):
Doing, right, And usually the New York City water is
going to pass all these tests like it's there's not
going to be a problem. This is just a extra
little quality assurance that they're doing because by the time
it reaches these testing stations, that's where it's going to
the taps anyway, it's tapping into the tap water basically, right,
so that ten percent of water goes through a couple
(35:35):
extra steps that is that that the other ninety percent
doesn't go through. One of the first things it does
in a treatment plan is it's mixed with alum which
is a component of aluminum, right, and alum attracts organic
compounds and basically says, rise to the surface with me,
and it creates flock, which is a white, frothy sludge,
(35:57):
and all that is just skimmed off the top.
Speaker 1 (36:00):
Yeah, this sounds so gross and it is, but like
in the end, you get your good water. The next
thing that happens is it flows through these giant water filters.
Day've put it as like these giant Brita filters. It's
essentially sort of the same thing. And this is just
going to further purify the water, passing through layers and
(36:20):
layers of stuff like sand and anthracite. And then comes
the ultra violet light that you referenced earlier, right.
Speaker 2 (36:28):
Yes, and one hundred percent of New York's water is
sent through a UV filter because UV filters are really
good at disrupting reproduction of bacteria, and so all water
is apped. But that ninety percent of water that's not
filtered that goes through a separate UV filtering plant that's
built just for those, that's right, And that's where like
(36:49):
a billion gallons of water a day are z apped
with UV lights. But so all of that gets combined
together eventually and comes out your tap. And New Yorkers
drink it straight from the tap. Literally. It is very
bizarre because I don't know if it's a placebo effect
or what, but I feel like it does taste pretty
(37:10):
good for tap water. It does, but at the same time,
I typically don't drink just straight tapwater, so my frame
of reference isn't necessarily right there.
Speaker 1 (37:19):
You want to hear something funny, Yeah, you know what
my brother's favorite water is and what it's probably just
a bit, but he claims it's true. What hose water?
Speaker 2 (37:28):
Oh, I know what he's talking about.
Speaker 1 (37:30):
Yeah, like when you're watering the car or watering the car.
When you're washing the car, here's right, grow car when
you're watering your mini, so it grows into an suv, right.
Speaker 2 (37:39):
So I think the reason why Scott is onto something
is because when you're drinking from a hose, it's summertime
and it's hot.
Speaker 1 (37:46):
Out, yeah, and you're probably working hard.
Speaker 2 (37:50):
Maybe it definitely it definitely does taste different, for sure.
Speaker 1 (37:53):
So when it comes to New York water, everyone says
it's the best in the country. There are rankings, actually,
and it is thirteen out of one hundred metro areas
in the US.
Speaker 2 (38:06):
So it's not the best literally by definition, not the
best water in the cut.
Speaker 1 (38:10):
You've got to move to Arlington, Texas if you want.
And this this was from ten years ago, but I'm
not sure what the current status is. Imagine Arlington's still
up there though.
Speaker 2 (38:19):
Sure, but you're going to have to have a lot
more reasons than that to move to Arlington, Texas. Ouch
that one, I'm not taking that.
Speaker 1 (38:27):
What are some of the problems though with New York water.
Speaker 2 (38:30):
Well, there's two big problems. Turbidity, which you mentioned earlier,
which is sediment suspension in the water, which gives it
kind of a cloudy or darker, gritty kind of look,
which is it's not just that it looks bad, its
pathogens can cling to that sediment, so it's not something
you want suspended. Plus it also makes it much more
(38:51):
difficult to filter that stuff out. It's like extra work
that has to be done to get rid of that sediment.
And if you're not filtering your water to begin with,
that's kind of a problem. And then secondly, the other
one is nutrients. It's over nutrient meaning it's just packed
with ribal flavor.
Speaker 1 (39:12):
Well, what it actually is is fertilizer runoff. You know,
those farmers are doing their best, but there is fertilizer
that goes downstream and runs into the watersheds, and phosphorus
is one of the biggest problems because farmers do fertilize
with phosphorus and if it runs off. The phosphorus alone
(39:33):
is not great because it can cause algae blooms and
stuff like that, and it can taste bad and stink.
Speaker 2 (39:39):
Yeah, because when the algae dies, it decays and it
does not smell good.
Speaker 1 (39:42):
No, it does not smell good. But a bigger problem, though,
is when you combine that with the chlorine. Because, like
we said, New York water is chlorinated and fluoridated. We
have the T shirts to prove.
Speaker 2 (39:53):
It, right. I don't think we said it was fluoridated,
but yeah, everybody knows.
Speaker 1 (39:57):
Yeah it's fluoridated. And when you combine that chlorine with
a phosphorus, it can create byproducts called disinfection byproducts, and
that is no good at all.
Speaker 2 (40:09):
No, those are nasty. They're called d bps and they
are basically like chemicals that are accidentally made from sanitizing water.
And not just with chlorine, but chlorine chlorine. There's a
bunch of different stuff that they use to disinfect water,
and all of them can combine with organic compounds to
(40:32):
create really just nasty stuff like carcinages or carcinogens. Some
can produce miscarriages. It's just really really bad stuff that
can be produced in the drinking water.
Speaker 1 (40:46):
Chloroform is one of those byproducts.
Speaker 2 (40:48):
Yeah, which is why New Yorkers frequently faint when they're
drinking tapwater.
Speaker 1 (40:53):
But this all sounds super scary New York City. They are.
They have I think there are eight to known contaminants,
but they are still apparently well under the legal limit,
depending on what you think about how the legal limits
are set.
Speaker 2 (41:10):
Up for it, right, exactly, it's a good caveat.
Speaker 1 (41:12):
But New York City drinking water is thirty point nine
parts per billion chloroform and the national average is eleven.
So they're way higher on chloroform. But as far as
all of those DBPs total, they're far below the legal
limit and just a little bit above average nationally.
Speaker 2 (41:28):
Right, And then the total number of DBPs that they
have is actually less than those in Arlington.
Speaker 1 (41:34):
So interesting.
Speaker 2 (41:35):
Chew on that Arlington.
Speaker 1 (41:36):
That's right, Chew on that bad pizza.
Speaker 2 (41:39):
Speaking of chewing, Chuck and pizza. Let's just answer this question.
Is New York City's water the key ingredient to New
York City bagels and pizza? H?
Speaker 1 (41:49):
I think, I mean, you can't definitively say, but I
think it does have something to do with it. For sure.
Speaker 2 (41:54):
It's got to because science is involved. So here's the thing.
The water from the Catskills and from the Delaware is
naturally soft, meaning that it's lowing calcium and magnesium. Where
do you fall on loving softer hard water? I'm a
hard water guy, same here man.
Speaker 1 (42:12):
When I lived in Arizona, they had soft water where
I lived in my sister's house that I lived in,
and most of the houses had water softening or I
guess hardening units or whatever in the house.
Speaker 2 (42:26):
Yeah, because you can't feel clean, like you never feel
like you got the shampoo or the soap off. It's awful.
It's just awful.
Speaker 1 (42:33):
Does anyone like soft water?
Speaker 2 (42:35):
I don't know, weirdo's probably.
Speaker 1 (42:37):
I mean hard water. Sorry, no, I had it all backwards.
Speaker 2 (42:42):
Okay, So so you like soft water.
Speaker 1 (42:44):
Yeah, that's why I actually, that's why I misspoke. They
had water softeners in Arizona because the water was hard
New York water is soft.
Speaker 2 (42:53):
I like soft, Okay, I like hard water typically because
I feel like I'm clean afterward. But water like just
the New York water is fine with me. But a
softened like a chemically softened water, I can't stand.
Speaker 1 (43:07):
Oh really, yes, interesting.
Speaker 2 (43:10):
But New York's is naturally soft, so it doesn't have calcium, magnesium,
or it's very low in those things comparatively, and that
actually has an effect on taste, like calcium and magnesium
can provide like a bitter taste to water. So there's
one thing that they're saying, like, Okay, the dough isn't
going to taste naturally bitter because of the calcium magnesium.
Speaker 1 (43:30):
That's something that is something, and it also interacts with
the flour. If you're going to make a bagel or
a biali or pizza crust, sure you can be or
you know a lot of things when you're baking, but
those are the big three. In New York. You're going
to be using flour and water as your base for
your dough and hard water. The minerals in those tapwater
(43:51):
are going to fortify the gluten and they're going to
make it tough and less flexible. You don't want it
too soft, though, because it'll have the opposite effect. It
will be gooey and you won't be able to work
it as well. Right, And apparently the American Chemical Society
says New York City tap water is the Goldilocks of
bagel water.
Speaker 2 (44:07):
It is just right yep, not too hard, not too soft,
just perfect for a begel and for a pizza. And
that that American Chemical Society quote came from a Smithsonian
article and they went on to say, probably though, it's
actually the techniques that New Yorkers use to make bagels.
Like they poach the bagel dough first, like they boil it.
Speaker 1 (44:28):
That's the only way to do a bagel. Sure it's boiled,
it's not a bagel.
Speaker 2 (44:31):
No it's not.
Speaker 1 (44:32):
It's like a bake donut. It's not a donut basically.
Speaker 2 (44:35):
And then they also will they'll let the yeast sit
for a little while to make it for mint, which
creates volatile flavor compounds, so it just tastes better. They're saying,
probably those are the reasons why New Yorkers make better
bagels or pizza. And it's not really the water. The
water just contributes a very small amount.
Speaker 1 (44:58):
I think it's all those things.
Speaker 2 (45:00):
Why not? No one can say for certain, so let's
just say yes, it is exactly things. Well, if you
want to know more about New York City's tap water,
go on to New York City and try their tap water.
And since I said that it's time for listener mail everybody.
Speaker 1 (45:16):
I'm gonna call this house rolling. And we talked about
tepeing houses. Yep, love the podcast. Guys, just finish up
trick or treating, and you were talking about rolling houses.
I grew up in Franklin, Tennessee, where we used to
roll houses all the time. In Franklin, Tennessee, for people
don't know, is where a lot of big shot Nashville
(45:37):
big wigs live because you can buy a huge house
with lots of land. That was Chuck speaking right. Funny
thing though, guys, I'm back to being Brandon. Okay, funny
thing though, guys. My neighbor was Brad Paisley. There was
a couple of years before his first Grammy award. And
once we found this out, we knew that we had
to get them. So my sister and I gathered all
(45:57):
of our friends dressed in black and snow out to
roll this country. Music Stars house. We were halfway through
the job when his freaking tour bus rolled up on us.
At first, we all ran away frightened, but we were
pretty much caught in the act. Nowhere to go. He
got off the bus and was super nice about the
whole thing. Actually, he gave us a quick tour of
the tour bus, chatted us up for a little while.
(46:19):
We even cleaned up the little bit of mess we
had made, and left starstruck. I highly doubt he remembers
that night at all, but my friends and I will
certainly never forget anyway. That's all I got. Guys, have
a spooky Halloween. That is from Brandon Saunders.
Speaker 2 (46:33):
That is very nice. Brandon, thanks a lot for that email,
and hats off to Brad Paisley for being so cool.
Speaker 1 (46:39):
He doesn't take his hat off, but.
Speaker 2 (46:41):
All right, exactly, but also how about just a hat
tip then?
Speaker 1 (46:44):
Yeah? Or actually I was thinking Kenny Chesney because he's bald.
Speaker 2 (46:47):
None of those guys take their hats off, dude. So
but also he hangs out with Peyton Manning, which means
that he must be a good guy. Right, Oh yeah,
isn't Peyton a good dude?
Speaker 1 (46:56):
Sure? I'm just tired of seeing him on my TV.
Speaker 2 (46:59):
Oh that's not gonna app anytime soon. Pretty soon you'll
see them in augmented reality, and you're going to say
everywhere you go, like it or not, Charles. Okay, Well,
if you want to get in touch with this, like
Brad Paisley did, you can go on to stuff youshould
Know dot com and check out our social links, and
you can also send us a good old fashioned email,
wrap it up, spank it on the bottom, with it
(47:21):
some good old country goodness, and send it off to
stuff podcast at iHeartRadio dot com.
Speaker 1 (47:29):
Stuff you Should Know is a production of iHeartRadio. For
more podcasts my heart Radio, visit the iHeartRadio app, Apple Podcasts,
or wherever you listen to your favorite shows.
Stuff You Should Know News
Hosts And Creators
Chuck Bryant
Josh Clark
Show Links
AboutOrder Our BookStoreSYSK ArmyRSSPopular Podcasts
On Purpose with Jay Shetty
I’m Jay Shetty host of On Purpose the worlds #1 Mental Health podcast and I’m so grateful you found us. I started this podcast 5 years ago to invite you into conversations and workshops that are designed to help make you happier, healthier and more healed. I believe that when you (yes you) feel seen, heard and understood you’re able to deal with relationship struggles, work challenges and life’s ups and downs with more ease and grace. I interview experts, celebrities, thought leaders and athletes so that we can grow our mindset, build better habits and uncover a side of them we’ve never seen before. New episodes every Monday and Friday. Your support means the world to me and I don’t take it for granted — click the follow button and leave a review to help us spread the love with On Purpose. I can’t wait for you to listen to your first or 500th episode!
Stuff You Should Know
If you've ever wanted to know about champagne, satanism, the Stonewall Uprising, chaos theory, LSD, El Nino, true crime and Rosa Parks, then look no further. Josh and Chuck have you covered.
Dateline NBC
Current and classic episodes, featuring compelling true-crime mysteries, powerful documentaries and in-depth investigations. Follow now to get the latest episodes of Dateline NBC completely free, or subscribe to Dateline Premium for ad-free listening and exclusive bonus content: DatelinePremium.com