Location: Croton Watershed
STRUCTURE/PROPERTY
Architect/Engineer/Other Responsible Parties:
Historic Use: Dam and reservoir for the Croton System
Present Use: Same
Typology: Dam/Reservoir
Period(s) of Construction: 1906-1911
Date of Decommissioning: N/A
Date(s) of Demolition: N/A
Structural System/Materials: Cyclopean masonry; 1110 feet long, 173 feet high; “The structure is cyclopean masonry, and was the only dam in the Croton group to use steel-reinforced concrete in the construction” (Water-works, 100).
MISCELLANEOUS
“The Croton Falls Reservoir is actually fed by three sources. It is located near the confluences of the West, Middle, and East Branches of the Croton River, just north of the town of Croton Falls. The largest part of the reservoir system, formed by the Hemlock Dam, is located on the West Branch and the Middle Branch. The water on the Middle Branch backs all the way to the toe of the Middle Branch Dam, a structure further upstream that had been completed only eighteen years earlier. On the eastern side of the Croton Falls Reservoir is a small body of water whose dam was built primarily for the purposes of diverting the water of the East Branch River to the main Croton Falls Dam. The eastern basin is connected through the intervening hill by a 3500-foot-long paved open-air channel … The structure is cyclopean masonry, and was the only dam in the Croton group to use steel-reinforced concrete in the construction. The diverting dam on the East Branch is a low earthen embankment 1,185 feet long, and the spillway is a beautiful stepped concrete channel 1,100 feet long” (Water-works, 100).
SOURCES
Kevin Bone, “The Extension of the Croton System,” Water-works: The Architecture and Engineering of the New York City Water Supply, Kevin Bone, ed. (New York: The Irwin S. Chanin School of Architecture of the Cooper Union and The Monacelli Press, 2006)
FICHE PREPARED BY
Jørgen G. Cleemann
The Croton Waterworks 