History
Providence's original public water supply came from the Pawtuxet River at Pettaconsett in Cranston. The plan was approved in 1869 and the first service pipe opened on December 1, 1871. By 1910, with Providence's heavy industry growing and the supply system being expanded to surrounding communities, people realized that the flow from Pettaconsett would soon fall short of the rising demands. For some years, extremely dry weather caused water consumption to exceed the natural flow of the river, and water had to be supplied by small reservoirs owned by mill companies further upstream.
In January 1913, the Providence City Council appointed a Water Supply Board to locate a larger water supply for the city. They found a potential source at the head of the North Branch Pawtuxet River and its two main tributaries, the Moswansicut and Ponaganset Rivers. A new Water Supply Board was appointed in 1915 with powers to enacted the legislation that cleared the way for construction of the reservoir.
Construction was well under way by 1921. At that time, it was the largest project ever undertaken in Rhode Island, and workers were housed in a temporary village established nearby. The reservoir was created by the construction of an earth-filled dam across the Pawtuxet River near the former village of Kent. The reservoir began storing water on November 10, 1925. The treatment plant began operation on September 30, 1926. At the official opening ceremonies that day, Providence Mayor Joseph H. Gainer called the $21,000,000 project the "City's Greatest" and said ".. the man to whom most of the credit for this undertaking belongs is Frank E. Winsor, the man who has been in charge of the work since 1915." The dam is known today as the Gainer Memorial Dam in honor of the mayor.
The plant was one of the most technologically advanced of its day and the only one of its kind in New England. It was renovated in the 1940s and again in the 1960s. It remains the largest treatment facility in New England today, with a maximum capacity of 144 million US gallons (550,000 m3) of water per day.
Read more about this topic: Scituate Reservoir
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