Living within the Watershed: Managing Water Use and Storage in a Growing Metropolis

Nicola Tynan, Dickinson College

As London’s population grew rapidly during the nineteenth century, calls for more accessible and higher quality water surfaced frequently and water supply was a contentious topic of debate. Waves of political attention brought forth bills for large infrastructure projects to transfer water to London from outside the Thames watershed, primarily from Wales. During the first half of the nineteenth century, water quality and cost were the biggest concerns. Water from Wales was argued to be cleaner and softer than that that available from the Thames. By the second half of the century, concerns that London would run out of water dominated the debate. Calls for municipal acquisition of London’s eight water companies and alternative water supplies was ongoing after the 1860s, intensifying with the creation of the London County Council in 1889. London’s water companies worked together to resist acquisition. They found solutions by increasing water storage, improving water quality, connecting networks, and managing domestic use in ways that allowed London to continue drawing all its water from eastern part of the Thames watershed. Looking back in 1950, the Metropolitan Water Board noted that extensive, early acquisition of land for reservoirs and watershed protection during the nineteenth century proved invaluable in securing London’s water supply a century later.

No extended abstract or paper available

 Presented in Session 52. Public Health and Environmental Planning