As someone who's fished both the Ashokan and Neversink reservoirs, many times over. I can attest that when the water level gets low enough, you can indeed see the remains of buildings!
@@alb12345672 It's much rarer there because most of the buildings were bulldozed when the Neversink was built. The most I've seen there is some old stone and masonry foundations. You might not even notice them if you're not paying attention. At Ashokan, the buildings are considerably more complete. Also, in my experience, the Neversink rarely gets as low as Ashokan and the water level seems more stable.
I used to go fishing at a lake near where I grew up in central NC, it had to be temporarily drained to construct a spillway or something, and while it was empty they found remains of an old wooden Confederate bridge that had been known to be somewhere in the area but had never been found. It was pretty cool driving by the empty lake and seeing all the vertical pilings sticking up out of the lake bed, plus more than a couple sunken boats 😆 whoops
I remember David Letterman once joking that NY didn't win first place for tap water, that was St. Paul, MN. NY did, however, 'runner-up' with best chunky style.
Here in Germany there is also a reservoir for a hydro electric damn. As per the city's in the video, there was one town which buildings were either destroyed or relocated, except for a bridge. Nearly every summer when the water level gets low enough, the bridge which leads over the initial stream gets completely out of the water and is indeed structural compliant to be walked over again, also many foundations of buildings are still there and can be seen when the water is low enough. The lake is called the Edersee.
That's really cool I bet it's awesome to walk over and see all the old architecture it's sad all the nature and man made beauty that is unfortunately lost and forgotten most times with the needs of the many outweighing the wants of the few
The bridge was not destroyed because its by law a historical building which is not allowed to be destroyed and therefore very time it re-surfaces the road department has to make a check-up.
We have a similar case nearby, last year or the year prior a bridge emerged from the water completely intact for the first time since the dam was built in the 50s
I lived near the Croton Dam and Resovoir and as a child I remember how a relatively severe drought lowered the water level and although there were no buildings or trees there were many stumps, stone walls and foundations although there was no town of any size there was an earlier dam then above water It was the 1842 Croton Dam which was dwarfed by the present Croton Dam built in the 1890s When the water was at its lowest water then flowed over the spillway of the old dam and a stone building on each side still existed although without its wooden roofs I lived in Ossining which the old aquiaduct built in 1842 went through the town's center and the double arch still stands as does the promenade
My grandmother grew up near there & I’ve got photos of the new dam being built, which were taken by my great-grandfather. I’ve always wondered the story behind the photos! My great-grandfather & great-grandmother took care of the Brandreth camp property-Mr. Brandreth owned a plaster factory in Ossining, but my grandmothers family lived out in the woods (a train and then wagon ride away!). Her brother worked there later in life too.
Grew up in Croton. We were told that when the residents moved out, after they removed everything else of value, they burned the building, so they could recover the square nails they were built with.
@@RussellPolo I've heard of that kind of thing about 100 or more years earlier but by the 1890s nails had become very cheap so it would hardly have been worth the effort All the result of the Industrial Revolution which is also the reason that Victorian styles with intricate woodwork had become relatively cheap to produce too
I still live right near there and the reservoirs by Brewster are really low right now so you can still see the old rock walls that used to mark out the property. A good way to find stuff (I know someone that found a decent stash of silver coins from the 1910s) is to metal detect along all those old walls.
The same thing happened in Massachusetts when the Quabbin Reservoir was constructed to supply water to Boston. Some towns were evacuated and flooded by the reservoir.
This has happened many many times all over the country. I live on the edge of a reservoir in NC, which used to have towns, and still has graveyards. Occasionally a dog will come home with a human bone. Seriously.
Dana, Enfield, Prescott, Greenwich. All flooded. Families and farmers got nearly zip from the state for the eminent domain takeover and almost no relocation assistance. Still today, Families in western central Mass still have disdain for the "commonwealth"...
same thing happened all over the country especially in the North East. To make the Quabbin Reservoir in Massachusetts four towns were flooded and are still in the water.
My grandfather worked on the Catskill aqueduct. My father born in 1915 lived there as a young boy while his dad worked there. By the way the reservoir’s name is actually pronounced AH-SHOW-CAN.
@@jennyknepper Yes Ashokan is the name of one of the communities that once existed where the reservoir is. The composer also lived in that area but I don’t believe he is old enough to have actually lived in the town.
The relocation of towns for projects like that happened a lot back then. One of my uncles grew up in Enfield, In Massachusetts. Enfield was flooded when The Qubban Reservoir was constructed to supply Boston with water . Houses, even cemeteries were relocated.
Eminent domain is a bitch they ran a highway through our small town a few years back they tried to buy a guy off his land he refused and they just took it for free in court
The Catskills were NOT the first city reservoirs by any stretch of the imagination. The city was fed by the Croton Aqueduct with the water of Westchester and Putnam Counties, beginning long before the turn of the century. Small communities were destroyed in whole or part at Kensico, Katonah, Kent Cliffs, Sunderlinville, Drewville and so on. The Catskill reservoirs and the tunnel under the river were an afterthought.
yes Mike an afterthought. They wanted them just because they could, though unconstitutionally. The cannonsville reservoir has not been used for drinking water and is only used for stream control downstream. The area could have boomed economically if recreation were allowed there. AND, they are the only reservoirs in the world that do not produce electricity. What a waste as NY is so well known to be.
There's a similar story in this near Dayton, Ohio. There was a town called "Osborn" that was located at where they wanted to create the flood plains to prevent floods that had happened before such as the 1913 flood. They wanted to demolish the town and make way for the flood plains. Instead, the people of Osborn literally moved the houses next to Fairfield Ohio. The two towns were eventually renamed to Fairborn, Ohio. Many of the original Osborn houses still stand in the Osborn historic district of Fairborn, Ohio.
My great-grandfather helped build a TVA damn. They flooded a whole town. When drained in the 80s, there is still a lot of the buildings under there. Butler TN. The dam supplies electricity for TVA.
In the 1950's we spend summers in the Catskills. Saugerties and Woodstock were villages near Ashokan, and I can remember seeing stone chimneys sticking out of the water in Ashokan, when we experience droughts.
Love the channel and the videos, how about some videos on lost mansions of Detroit, New York etc., etc., I imagine there's a fair few beautiful buildings lost to history....😥
In Colebrook, Connecticut, there is a reservoir created the better part of a century ago. When the water level gets low enough there, you can see the old roads, some foundations as well as an old bridge. All from when the valley used for the reservoir was a village inside of the town proper.
Great video, perhaps in the future you could cover the rest of the reservoirs that were built over towns in upstate new york~ I grew up around Rome/Utica and always heard stories from my older family members about how the state government flooded the town of Delta for the expansion of the Erie canal.
That was interesting. I had no idea New York had such a massive reservoir and aqueduct project. When I was a kid someone told me that NYC uses enough water per day to fill up the Empire State Building twice. I have no idea if that's true, but it sounds fun, ha. A few towns and innumerable archeological sites were flooded when they dammed the Colorado River to form Lake Powell and Lake Mead, and due to ongoing droughts out here (I'm in UT) they're both at all time low levels. Same with the Great Salt Lake.
I’ve seen that level has been low for a concerning amount of time. I’m not sure if it’s accurate either but I heard Lake Mead may never recover which is scary
@@floydb5668 Are you talking about the Great Salt Lake being that low, or one of the others? There's a father and son team from Vegas with a UA-cam channel called Sin City Outdoors (something like that anyway) and they've been monitoring the level of Lake Mead. Holy smokes, it is BONKERS! I was at Powell this spring and a big rock formation that used to be an island is now high and dry. It's been lowering and lowering for 20+ years, but considering how many millions of people rely on the Colorado for drinking water and crops, it's become dire! The Great Salt Lake has also been drying out for years. Earlier this year they said it was at a near record-setting low and I think they've said it finally hit the mark. All the sailboats had to be crained out of the water and onto trailers. (Edit: Oh, and you're totally right. It would take several years of wetter-than-normal winter snowpack to bring the levels back up.)
@@floydb5668 Lake Mead was last at full capacity in 1989 and there is no chance of it ever reaching that level again. The population of SoCal, AZ and NV has increased by over 15 million people since the lake was full. There has also been a massive increase in water used for agriculture in CA and AZ. It is time for California and Arizona to wake up and realize that they have already wasted the water that was intended as a reserve for dry years. They have farmed the desert to such an extreme that the dams are unable to maintain enough water flows to generate power. Several generators are shut down and more are expected to be shut down soon. John Oliver gave an oversimplified but accurate overview of the water issues in the southwest recently.
Well, speaking in particular to the Great Salt Lake, when we visited SLC c. 1985 the Great Salt Lake was rising and keep causing southern interstate highway to be re-paved to raise it above the water. At one time, they were either considering or actually raising some of the overpasses. Around that time, there was so much rain that "Emigration Rd/trail" was used as a waterway. IOW: this, too, will pass.
I found this very informative. Interesting to see how with the technology of the time the how this was put in place. You ask for other ideas for shows. Texas has many lakes with only one natural. Half in Texas the other half in Louisiana called Caddo Lake. All the others would share the story’s of New York.
The village of Katonah in Westchester county was to be flooded in the 1890s for construction of the Muscoot Reservoir of the Croton system. The houses were all relocated to the site of today’s village
At one time the thugs in the Board of Water Supply were all set to flood parts of Patterson NY for a reservoir, I guess it was too expensive for the amount of water they'd have gotten out of it.
There was a similar situation near where I grew up. The formation of Lock and Dam No 2 on the Mississippi River flooded out a small community on an island in the middle of the river. It’s all underwater now, but the county plat maps still list the now flooded land parcels. It’s strange.
Amazing! i grew up not far from that area and am fascinated by infrastructure works... So what i'd like to know next is where does all that water go after people are done with it
Yeah, I live between Ulster and Schoharie so I've seen multiple ones. They're absolutely stunning, but I never thought about those who suffered for them. I couldn't imagine being told to move because my house is going to be torn down and I have no say.
When I lived the 4th house down from the cannonsville I got very interested in the history. My grandfather was the head mechanic at queensfarms in the late 40s before it got flooded
! Its still a heavy price. There are dozens of things you cant do in Catskills to keep water pure cos they don't want to filter water. Meanwhile, Catskill residents are not allowed to use the water in those reservoirs !
So many those poor people that had forms for hundreds of years. Many were Dutch descent! Remind me of what is going on now in the Netherlands. There were some people committing suicide! They knew from the test borings that the dam would not hold. Someone told me the holes are still there.
In a way, it reminds me of the movie "motherless Brooklyn" with a twinge of "Chinatown" peppered in. Relocating whole villages, neighborhoods or townships. One was in the way of transportation, the other in the way of satisfying the need of a water supply for one of the largest cities in the world.
relocating sounds so nice. The people had to relocate themselves. AND, they were not justly compensated for their possessions and time. I remember as I lived there as a child.
@@richmoore5525 Absolutely! My Grandfather's farm was taken for NYC water. And they were not justly compensated for losing their life savings that had gone into their homes and farms. I grew up with an intense hatred for NYC.
He talks about "rumor of relocated homes" , Several buildings in Katonah, were moved from the rising waters. Photos are easy to find and even real-estate listings will mention it.
Maybe you could make a video about the TVA dam & electrical system. Many towns and people were moved. It is also a big human interest story. Happy Trails
My Uncle Johnny enjoyed scuba diving as a hobby. He belonged to a club and they would occasionally dive in Reservoirs. Most of the members were police officers. He told me on one dive they found an entire small town. He said you could swim through some buildings that were still intact. The top of the church steeple would become visible when the water level was low.
The town of Monticello, which the dam was named after, still is visible when the water gets low enough. It also has a unique spillway called the glory hole
@@lightningdemolition1964 I'm actually from the area, and I'm very familiar with the glory hole. I didn't get a chance to see the town or the glory hole when water levels were so low due to drought.
Hey have you ever considered a video on California's Big Creek Water Project? It consists of 6 major reservoirs, numerous smaller reservoirs, dams, and aqueducts, miles of penstocks, connecting together 8 major Hydroelectric powerhouses Designed by the single mastermind of John Eastwood build between 1910 and 1917? And for the first time, it was not drinking water that was the primary goal of this water project but Cheap Hydroelectric power first, flood control second, and drinking/irrigation water last. And in 1987 Southern California Edison added the ninth underground power turbine to "complete" project. What makes the Big Creek Project interesting is its design was the vision of one man John Eastwood in an era with no computers, just slide rules, pencils, and paper. Second years before the project began (the late 1880s) Eastwood personally surveyed the land himself high in California's remote Sierra Nevada mountains, with the closest "major" Town being Fresno over 70+ miles away. The Big Creek project was built in an extremely remote and unpopulated area of Sierra Nevada. From 1910 -1912 all the men, supplies, and building equipment were brought by mule trains and horseback until July of 1912 when a rail line was successfully completed reducing a 10 day trip from Fresno by wagon to a 2 day train ride. Since you enjoy Civil engineering projects on a grand and complex scale I think you would find California's The Big Creek Water Project fascinating.
I grew up in the Bronx, and as a kid playing outside in the hot summer, I would run upstairs, turn on the bathtub faucet, and drink from it. The water was always ice cold and delicious!!
Interesting that there was no mention of the Kensico Reservoir, one of the very last stops before the water reaches the city. There’s a church & roads under there too.
Yup. The residents of what was then Kensico were relocated to the newly built town of Valhalla, NY, which remains alongside the Kensico Dam and reservoir today.
As a child, I would spend several weeks every summer with my grandparents in Queens, NY. One summer, I became so accustomed to their tap water, when I returned to the DC area, I couldn’t drink the water. I found the taste a bit “off.” I eventually got used to my tap water, and years later realized that the off taste was (still is) due to high chlorination.
This is a great video I learned a lot I didn't know about NYC. I have a idea for a similar video you could do Lake Nockamixon in north Bucks county PA has a town in it. They flooded a valley that had a whole town in it when they made it. It was made in 1972 I think. So the town in their is a more recent town.
I appreciate your video, but....as was previously noted in prior posts. ..... you completely overlooked the impact the Muscoot and Croton reservoir systems had on a more densely populated area just north of NYC in Westchester and Putnam counties. Those water supply systems were created much earlier than the Catskills systems.
Huge fan of your work. Quick question…what’s the name of the background music with the fender rhodes piano and drums? Too low to make out but it sounds right up my alley!
I live in Missouri and we have a lake called Table Rock Lake and there is a notable town that got flooded when the lake was created that a ride business called Ride the Ducks used to have boat cars that would take you over the lake and they would have a bunch of info and stop above where the town would be. Sadly, they had to shut down when on July 19, 2018 a boat had sunk in thunderstorms and killed 17 people. But there have been people who have scuba dived down there and you can see old buildings that didn't get demolished down there and every once and awhile some old stuff resurfaces when the level gets low enough.
Boyds Corner in the Town of Kent was one of the first reservoirs in the Croton System. It was also the first dam to be redone due to corruption in the building of the dam by Tammany Hall. In the 80's the reservoir had to be drained for the NYCDEP to work on it. I remember driving along NY 301 and seeing many remanemts of the old building foundations and rockwalls that commonly found in Putnam County. Boyds Corners is relatively small but big enough to see what impact it had on the area known as Kent Cliffs.
i live in pa, and lake promised land is an artifical resivoir, there is an entire town under it and at “low tide” you can see the brick buildings. it’s very creepy.
If they had to be kicked out of their homes the city could at least give them compensation such as money to move to another place and start a new life.
"The needs of the many out weigh the few." Except in the US the individual is supposed to be paramount out weigh the many. Giving up your land for the others isn't supposed to be allowed.
NYC is on an ocean. Technology has advanced to where desalination should be an economic option, and they wouldn't have to trample on the rights of others (but that wouldn't be NYC-like, if they couldn't look down on everyone else).
yes, but instead NYC was greedy and wanted to steal from others because they could. NYC has used and abused the upstate for so long because that is where the majority of legislators come from. So much for Democracy and screw everybody else. In the end though. It has destroyed itself and the rest of the state.
What do you mean they *removed* trees/ect? Around here they just flood the area once the dam is finished and call it good. The submerged dead trees under the water are super creepy.
At this point, trere are 2 tunnels that supply the water into NYC that are literally crumbling due to age, a lack of maintenance, and a higher volume of water then they were designed for. There is a much larger third they have been digging for decades, once that is finished, it's close, they can actually shut down, repair and upgrade each of the existing tunnels.
This is the problem with majority rule. The little people have no rights or protection. Even when eminent domain is used they don't pay the actual value.
i remember reading a picture book as a kid that focused on 2 children living in a town that starts to get moved and demolished to make way for a reservoir
Just pay the people 4-times what their land value is worth, according to current market values, if they owned it 'prior' to the project being approved (and 'at market value', if they were scam artists and they bought it recently, in hopes of making money off of the project). This would then give affected people more than enough cash to make up for their loss, and allow them to move elsewhere, and have some money left over, and prevent scam artists from making money off this.
Only people that had places where they were building the dam walls and other structures got paid, people that were going to be in the middle and flooded out, too bad, so sad. That is the history of what NY politics is about, screwing over the minority for the benefit of the majority.
BINGO & Amen! Perhaps not 4 times BUT a minimum 20% premium of prior "fair market/tax" value with extra bonuses for each year in occupancy. Likewise, stakeholders should be compensated. For most projects, the land is a minor component of the total cost.
The problem with that is define what it's worth. Houses, land, businesses, going concerns that have goodwill. These are all a matter for skilled appraisers and take a lot of time to figure out. The water board doesn't want to overpay and unjustly enrich someone so they just offer what they say it's worth and no more.
Even in the north Appalachian people are considered expendable. I have seen one of these in person, I forget which as I was a kid at the time. You can see the remains of homes in the right conditions.
love living less than 30minutes away from the ashokan but get yummy hudson river water that taste like a pool and comes out brown half the time while the city gets some of the best in the north east
Nice video with lots of information, although the pronunciations could be better. ( uh-SHOW-kin ) Also, Gilboa was moved but only to a tiny spot on the hill below the dam, and it never really stuck. Only 5 buildings and they burned down a few years later. Gilboa finally gave up and there is no real town center. There is a post office, police department, and town hall. But the residents are very much still there. There is a very nice museum near the dam that has lots of information and pictures of the old town and the building of the dam. It's worth a visit.
Check out Barkhamsted CT. Located in Litchfield county it celebrated its 150yr anniversary before it dissapeared beneath the waters of the Barkhamsted Resevoir
In Kentucky and Tennessee, many towns went underwater to create electricity for the areas in the 1940s and early 1950s. The down my mom was born in, Eadsville, KY, was flooded by the building of the Wolf Creek Dam. 12 other small communities disappeared, too. The Tennessee Valley Authority and The Army Corps of Engineers built I think around 25 dams all over KY and TN devastating over 43 communities as small as 30 people and as large as 1,500.
Reminds me so much of the lost villages of the st Lawrence sea way project a joint venture to build a dam to power Canada and the usa. You truly if that water is low enough see the old sidewalks a streets. Its a popular place for diver's to visit. So even have put videos on UA-cam
I'm guessing it's so that there's less chance of debris clogging up the intakes for the aquaducts/etc. same reason likely to remove all the trees and shrubs.
I'm in American NJ Northern area in the mountains I got well water LOL mine's natural drinking water we naturally heat our house also soooo there are thousands of people that still do use just fresh drinking water from well or streams
The plan for the Hoover Dam, Lake Mead and the water supply for southern Cal was understood at the time of planning to be inadequate for the projected population that would inhabit the area. There were to be subsequent aspects of the project as the population grew, but that never happened and what we see today is the decimation of the system.
As someone who's fished both the Ashokan and Neversink reservoirs, many times over. I can attest that when the water level gets low enough, you can indeed see the remains of buildings!
I know about the Ashokan but the Neversink too???
@@alb12345672 It's much rarer there because most of the buildings were bulldozed when the Neversink was built. The most I've seen there is some old stone and masonry foundations. You might not even notice them if you're not paying attention. At Ashokan, the buildings are considerably more complete. Also, in my experience, the Neversink rarely gets as low as Ashokan and the water level seems more stable.
I used to go fishing at a lake near where I grew up in central NC, it had to be temporarily drained to construct a spillway or something, and while it was empty they found remains of an old wooden Confederate bridge that had been known to be somewhere in the area but had never been found. It was pretty cool driving by the empty lake and seeing all the vertical pilings sticking up out of the lake bed, plus more than a couple sunken boats 😆 whoops
Didn't one of those "ponds" have amazingly clear/transparent water?
Great vide. Very informative: ua-cam.com/video/EdoZMurKQJA/v-deo.html
I remember David Letterman once joking that NY didn't win first place for tap water, that was St. Paul, MN. NY did, however, 'runner-up' with best chunky style.
I read something that said in a blind test, NYC tap water was favored over pricey imported bottled water.
Living in the Tennessee Valley I’m used to hearing about flooded and abandoned towns, but I never hear the history of the towns. Great video!
Have you ever checked into the salary of the individual running the TVA! It is outrageous!
@@edwinsalau150 have you realized all they do for us?
@@Cm-lp4mu A little defensive, are we?
@@RCAvhstape I only asked if they knew how much they provide for us.
@@Cm-lp4mu I'm sure it's worth whatever that guy is getting paid.
Here in Germany there is also a reservoir for a hydro electric damn. As per the city's in the video, there was one town which buildings were either destroyed or relocated, except for a bridge. Nearly every summer when the water level gets low enough, the bridge which leads over the initial stream gets completely out of the water and is indeed structural compliant to be walked over again, also many foundations of buildings are still there and can be seen when the water is low enough. The lake is called the Edersee.
That's really cool I bet it's awesome to walk over and see all the old architecture it's sad all the nature and man made beauty that is unfortunately lost and forgotten most times with the needs of the many outweighing the wants of the few
@@justinthompson1381 ...would you rather have to worry 'bout cholera every time you flush your toilet...?
@@ThomasDeLello I'd rather worry about your Grammer.
The bridge was not destroyed because its by law a historical building which is not allowed to be destroyed and therefore very time it re-surfaces the road department has to make a check-up.
We have a similar case nearby, last year or the year prior a bridge emerged from the water completely intact for the first time since the dam was built in the 50s
I lived near the Croton Dam and Resovoir and as a child I remember how a relatively severe drought lowered the water level and although there were no buildings or trees there were many stumps, stone walls and foundations although there was no town of any size there was an earlier dam then above water It was the 1842 Croton Dam which was dwarfed by the present Croton Dam built in the 1890s When the water was at its lowest water then flowed over the spillway of the old dam and a stone building on each side still existed although without its wooden roofs I lived in Ossining which the old aquiaduct built in 1842 went through the town's center and the double arch still stands as does the promenade
My grandmother grew up near there & I’ve got photos of the new dam being built, which were taken by my great-grandfather. I’ve always wondered the story behind the photos! My great-grandfather & great-grandmother took care of the Brandreth camp property-Mr. Brandreth owned a plaster factory in Ossining, but my grandmothers family lived out in the woods (a train and then wagon ride away!). Her brother worked there later in life too.
Grew up in Croton. We were told that when the residents moved out, after they removed everything else of value, they burned the building, so they could recover the square nails they were built with.
@@RussellPolo yep nails used to be hand made
@@RussellPolo I've heard of that kind of thing about 100 or more years earlier but by the 1890s nails had become very cheap so it would hardly have been worth the effort All the result of the Industrial Revolution which is also the reason that Victorian styles with intricate woodwork had become relatively cheap to produce too
I still live right near there and the reservoirs by Brewster are really low right now so you can still see the old rock walls that used to mark out the property. A good way to find stuff (I know someone that found a decent stash of silver coins from the 1910s) is to metal detect along all those old walls.
The same thing happened in Massachusetts when the Quabbin Reservoir was constructed to supply water to Boston. Some towns were evacuated and flooded by the reservoir.
This has happened many many times all over the country. I live on the edge of a reservoir in NC, which used to have towns, and still has graveyards. Occasionally a dog will come home with a human bone. Seriously.
Dana, Enfield, Prescott, Greenwich. All flooded. Families and farmers got nearly zip from the state for the eminent domain takeover and almost no relocation assistance. Still today, Families in western central Mass still have disdain for the "commonwealth"...
@@OldLugnutz As they should. 😉
See the children's book "Letting Swift River Go" by Jane Yolen. 💔
I lived the Catskills. This is a part of our history. The Board of Water Supply was almost as well loved as the Nazis.
same thing happened all over the country especially in the North East. To make the Quabbin Reservoir in Massachusetts four towns were flooded and are still in the water.
@B Babbich Let New York City desalinate the ocean instead of claiming eninent domain over Upstate rural folks. Disgusting!
@B Babbich NY pays for itself this bullshit of cities supporting rural people is just that.
I wish there would be some time-lapse videos of these lakes being filled and seeing the towns go under.
That would be so cool
My grandfather worked on the Catskill aqueduct. My father born in 1915 lived there as a young boy while his dad worked there. By the way the reservoir’s name is actually pronounced AH-SHOW-CAN.
I was about to mention the mispronunciation. :) - signed a Kingston NY resident
As in “Ashokan Farewell”?
@@jennyknepper Yes Ashokan is the name of one of the communities that once existed where the reservoir is. The composer also lived in that area but I don’t believe he is old enough to have actually lived in the town.
I lived right on the ashokan reservoir for 19 years of my life. Went fishing there as a kid. Was going to say the same thing
@@thomasfreeman7770 Jay lives in the modern (relocated) village of Ashokan, south of the reservoir.
The underground aqueduct that connects the Schoharie Reservoir with the Ashokan Reservoir is known as the Shandaken Tunnel, not the Schoharie Tunnel.
Man, y'all got some funny name in New York (says the guy from a state with a town named Lizard Lick)
@@cleverusername9369 We also have an East Aurora well west of Aurora.
I once did a motorcycle ride near the Gilboa dam (Schoharie Reservoir) and that part of the state. What a great day that was.
We ride up there all the time stop in BBQ place in Middleburg theu got a nice ride mapped out for the catskills
The relocation of towns for projects like that happened a lot back then. One of my uncles grew up in Enfield, In Massachusetts. Enfield was flooded when The Qubban Reservoir was constructed to supply Boston with water . Houses, even cemeteries were relocated.
Eminent domain is a bitch they ran a highway through our small town a few years back they tried to buy a guy off his land he refused and they just took it for free in court
New York City did not relocate homes. They gave the farm owners low-ball prices.
@@debpratt52 good ole eminent domain. Same thing with the land that is home to Central Park.
Gilboa, NY. When the water level drops on the old reservoir, you can see the foundations of the old town.
sure can. Know the area well.
I WANT TO LIVE IN AN UNSUSTAINABLE CITY SO YOU HAVE TO MOVE FROM YOUR SMALL SUSTAINABLE VILLAGE...
sounds about right
The Catskills were NOT the first city reservoirs by any stretch of the imagination. The city was fed by the Croton Aqueduct with the water of Westchester and Putnam Counties, beginning long before the turn of the century. Small communities were destroyed in whole or part at Kensico, Katonah, Kent Cliffs, Sunderlinville, Drewville and so on. The Catskill reservoirs and the tunnel under the river were an afterthought.
I'm from there... I know.
Isn't Katonah a stop on the Metro North line?
@@patriciadevereaux3886 Yes. Part of the town was moved for the Cross River Reservoir.
yes Mike an afterthought. They wanted them just because they could, though unconstitutionally. The cannonsville reservoir has not been used for drinking water and is only used for stream control downstream. The area could have boomed economically if recreation were allowed there. AND, they are the only reservoirs in the world that do not produce electricity. What a waste as NY is so well known to be.
they should have just taken water from upstream Hudson river. So much easier for all around.
There's a similar story in this near Dayton, Ohio.
There was a town called "Osborn" that was located at where they wanted to create the flood plains to prevent floods that had happened before such as the 1913 flood. They wanted to demolish the town and make way for the flood plains. Instead, the people of Osborn literally moved the houses next to Fairfield Ohio. The two towns were eventually renamed to Fairborn, Ohio. Many of the original Osborn houses still stand in the Osborn historic district of Fairborn, Ohio.
There's story's like this everywhere. Md has at least 2
I lived in Fairfield very beautiful town I always love The view from rising Park
I live in Sullivan County, NY and use well water - it is really does taste great! No wonder NYC wants to take it.
NYC wants to take everything they can.
My great-grandfather helped build a TVA damn. They flooded a whole town. When drained in the 80s, there is still a lot of the buildings under there. Butler TN. The dam supplies electricity for TVA.
There's alot of buried towns and cities
My grandfather worked for the TVA in the 1930s. He was a civil engineer. I wonder if he worked with your great-grandfather. That would be cool.
Both sides of my family were involved. Dad's grandfather worked to build the dam and Mom's had to relocate before they flooded their farm.
In the 1950's we spend summers in the Catskills. Saugerties and Woodstock were villages near Ashokan, and I can remember seeing stone chimneys sticking out of the water in Ashokan, when we experience droughts.
Love the channel and the videos, how about some videos on lost mansions of Detroit, New York etc., etc., I imagine there's a fair few beautiful buildings lost to history....😥
In Colebrook, Connecticut, there is a reservoir created the better part of a century ago. When the water level gets low enough there, you can see the old roads, some foundations as well as an old bridge. All from when the valley used for the reservoir was a village inside of the town proper.
Great video, perhaps in the future you could cover the rest of the reservoirs that were built over towns in upstate new york~ I grew up around Rome/Utica and always heard stories from my older family members about how the state government flooded the town of Delta for the expansion of the Erie canal.
That was interesting. I had no idea New York had such a massive reservoir and aqueduct project. When I was a kid someone told me that NYC uses enough water per day to fill up the Empire State Building twice. I have no idea if that's true, but it sounds fun, ha.
A few towns and innumerable archeological sites were flooded when they dammed the Colorado River to form Lake Powell and Lake Mead, and due to ongoing droughts out here (I'm in UT) they're both at all time low levels. Same with the Great Salt Lake.
I’ve seen that level has been low for a concerning amount of time. I’m not sure if it’s accurate either but I heard Lake Mead may never recover which is scary
@@floydb5668 Are you talking about the Great Salt Lake being that low, or one of the others? There's a father and son team from Vegas with a UA-cam channel called Sin City Outdoors (something like that anyway) and they've been monitoring the level of Lake Mead. Holy smokes, it is BONKERS! I was at Powell this spring and a big rock formation that used to be an island is now high and dry. It's been lowering and lowering for 20+ years, but considering how many millions of people rely on the Colorado for drinking water and crops, it's become dire! The Great Salt Lake has also been drying out for years. Earlier this year they said it was at a near record-setting low and I think they've said it finally hit the mark. All the sailboats had to be crained out of the water and onto trailers.
(Edit: Oh, and you're totally right. It would take several years of wetter-than-normal winter snowpack to bring the levels back up.)
@@floydb5668 Lake Mead was last at full capacity in 1989 and there is no chance of it ever reaching that level again. The population of SoCal, AZ and NV has increased by over 15 million people since the lake was full. There has also been a massive increase in water used for agriculture in CA and AZ.
It is time for California and Arizona to wake up and realize that they have already wasted the water that was intended as a reserve for dry years. They have farmed the desert to such an extreme that the dams are unable to maintain enough water flows to generate power. Several generators are shut down and more are expected to be shut down soon.
John Oliver gave an oversimplified but accurate overview of the water issues in the southwest recently.
@@hewhohasnoidentity4377 I appreciate you going into more detail 👍thanks
Well, speaking in particular to the Great Salt Lake, when we visited SLC c. 1985 the Great Salt Lake was rising and keep causing southern interstate highway to be re-paved to raise it above the water. At one time, they were either considering or actually raising some of the overpasses. Around that time, there was so much rain that "Emigration Rd/trail" was used as a waterway.
IOW: this, too, will pass.
I found this very informative. Interesting to see how with the technology of the time the how this was put in place. You ask for other ideas for shows. Texas has many lakes with only one natural. Half in Texas the other half in Louisiana called Caddo Lake. All the others would share the story’s of New York.
Wow…really? Arkansan here..I’ve seen lots of Texan lakes but it never occurred to me that they were all man-made. Weird…
In 1914 a dam was built for the lake. So not as "natural" as one would think.
This is a modern era version of cities conquering surrounding areas
The village of Katonah in Westchester county was to be flooded in the 1890s for construction of the Muscoot Reservoir of the Croton system. The houses were all relocated to the site of today’s village
At one time the thugs in the Board of Water Supply were all set to flood parts of Patterson NY for a reservoir, I guess it was too expensive for the amount of water they'd have gotten out of it.
@@SenileOtakuEast of Hudson system was pretty built out by then and land prices were much cheaper across the Hudson.
There was a similar situation near where I grew up. The formation of Lock and Dam No 2 on the Mississippi River flooded out a small community on an island in the middle of the river. It’s all underwater now, but the county plat maps still list the now flooded land parcels. It’s strange.
I’m in Hastings. Tell me more😮
Wow! That was pretty cool! I had no idea the system that was in place was sooo freekin large! Awesome video
Amazing! i grew up not far from that area and am fascinated by infrastructure works... So what i'd like to know next is where does all that water go after people are done with it
I lived near some of these and I always appreciated them for their beauty
Yeah, I live between Ulster and Schoharie so I've seen multiple ones. They're absolutely stunning, but I never thought about those who suffered for them. I couldn't imagine being told to move because my house is going to be torn down and I have no say.
@@Unfamous-Chronicles I completely agree
When I lived the 4th house down from the cannonsville I got very interested in the history. My grandfather was the head mechanic at queensfarms in the late 40s before it got flooded
! Its still a heavy price. There are dozens of things you cant do in Catskills to keep water pure cos they don't want to filter water. Meanwhile, Catskill residents are not allowed to use the water in those reservoirs !
The whole vid was great. Really liked the personification you gave the city when talking about Neversink.
Dr. Pol would be proud of you Josh. Hey, I’m proud of you! Great job.
"A-Sho-Can" is how you pronounce the reservoir's name.
"E-so-pus" is how you pronounce the rivers name
And RON-dout not Round-dout
Thank you bro!! Lol
Right, long E and O to pronounce Esopus. Long O in Ashokan. Stress put on the 2nd syllable of both words.
Please do a it's history segment on the town of Oscarville and lake laneir, Georgia I think people will find it interesting....
Please cover the Tock's Island Dam project. So glad it never happened but the towns are gone nonetheless.
So many those poor people that had forms for hundreds of years. Many were Dutch descent! Remind me of what is going on now in the Netherlands. There were some people committing suicide!
They knew from the test borings that the dam would not hold. Someone told me the holes are still there.
In a way, it reminds me of the movie "motherless Brooklyn" with a twinge of "Chinatown" peppered in. Relocating whole villages, neighborhoods or townships. One was in the way of transportation, the other in the way of satisfying the need of a water supply for one of the largest cities in the world.
That was Robert Moses, who in my opinion was a destroyer of NY
relocating sounds so nice. The people had to relocate themselves. AND, they were not justly compensated for their possessions and time. I remember as I lived there as a child.
@@richmoore5525 Absolutely! My Grandfather's farm was taken for NYC water. And they were not justly compensated for losing their life savings that had gone into their homes and farms. I grew up with an intense hatred for NYC.
He talks about "rumor of relocated homes" , Several buildings in Katonah, were moved from the rising waters. Photos are easy to find and even real-estate listings will mention it.
How do only 2.8 million people use NYC tap water when it has 9 million people alone, not including Westchester 🤔
Maybe you could make a video about the TVA dam & electrical system. Many towns and people were moved. It is also a big human interest story. Happy Trails
My Uncle Johnny enjoyed scuba diving as a hobby. He belonged to a club and they would
occasionally dive in Reservoirs. Most of the members were police officers.
He told me on one dive they found an entire small town. He said you could swim through
some buildings that were still intact. The top of the church steeple would become visible
when the water level was low.
Interesting... Did he take underwater pictures...?
@@ThomasDeLello no
Please cover the creation of Late Berryessa. Straight flooded a valley and to this day a town rests beneath it.
The town of Monticello, which the dam was named after, still is visible when the water gets low enough. It also has a unique spillway called the glory hole
@@lightningdemolition1964 I'm actually from the area, and I'm very familiar with the glory hole. I didn't get a chance to see the town or the glory hole when water levels were so low due to drought.
Tennessee Kentucky and Vermont have THE best tasting water 💦💧
The TVA did the same thing during the depression when making Kentucky Lake and Barkley Lake
Hey have you ever considered a video on California's Big Creek Water Project? It consists of 6 major reservoirs, numerous smaller reservoirs, dams, and aqueducts, miles of penstocks, connecting together 8 major Hydroelectric powerhouses Designed by the single mastermind of John Eastwood build between 1910 and 1917? And for the first time, it was not drinking water that was the primary goal of this water project but Cheap Hydroelectric power first, flood control second, and drinking/irrigation water last. And in 1987 Southern California Edison added the ninth underground power turbine to "complete" project. What makes the Big Creek Project interesting is its design was the vision of one man John Eastwood in an era with no computers, just slide rules, pencils, and paper. Second years before the project began (the late 1880s) Eastwood personally surveyed the land himself high in California's remote Sierra Nevada mountains, with the closest "major" Town being Fresno over 70+ miles away. The Big Creek project was built in an extremely remote and unpopulated area of Sierra Nevada. From 1910 -1912 all the men, supplies, and building equipment were brought by mule trains and horseback until July of 1912 when a rail line was successfully completed reducing a 10 day trip from Fresno by wagon to a 2 day train ride. Since you enjoy Civil engineering projects on a grand and complex scale I think you would find California's The Big Creek Water Project fascinating.
wow, that was so interesting. thanks
I grew up in the Bronx, and as a kid playing outside in the hot summer, I would run upstairs, turn on the bathtub faucet, and drink from it. The water was always ice cold and delicious!!
Why... why wouldn't you just use a cup and the sink like a civilized human being?
@@cleverusername9369 average new yorker
Interesting that there was no mention of the Kensico Reservoir, one of the very last stops before the water reaches the city. There’s a church & roads under there too.
Yup. The residents of what was then Kensico were relocated to the newly built town of Valhalla, NY, which remains alongside the Kensico Dam and reservoir today.
As a child, I would spend several weeks every summer with my grandparents in Queens, NY. One summer, I became so accustomed to their tap water, when I returned to the DC area, I couldn’t drink the water. I found the taste a bit “off.” I eventually got used to my tap water, and years later realized that the off taste was (still is) due to high chlorination.
This is a great video I learned a lot I didn't know about NYC. I have a idea for a similar video you could do Lake Nockamixon in north Bucks county PA has a town in it. They flooded a valley that had a whole town in it when they made it. It was made in 1972 I think. So the town in their is a more recent town.
My only water is a 100 year old handdug cistern well fully lined with rocks and boulders to 35 feet deep.
How's it taste? Better than city, I would imagine
I appreciate your video, but....as was previously noted in prior posts. ..... you completely overlooked the impact the Muscoot and Croton reservoir systems had on a more densely populated area just north of NYC in Westchester and Putnam counties. Those water supply systems were created much earlier than the Catskills systems.
Huge fan of your work. Quick question…what’s the name of the background music with the fender rhodes piano and drums? Too low to make out but it sounds right up my alley!
Ah-sho-kan. E-so-pus. At certain times, one may in fact see subsurface structures in the Ashokan.
Great Linguistic education on our lovely little towns❤️
I'm so amazed at what was accomplished in the "Old Days". The original Erie Canal still baffles me.
Be interesting if dive teams went down for a look.
“The needs of the many out way the need of the few.”
interesting story. Thank you
I live in Missouri and we have a lake called Table Rock Lake and there is a notable town that got flooded when the lake was created that a ride business called Ride the Ducks used to have boat cars that would take you over the lake and they would have a bunch of info and stop above where the town would be. Sadly, they had to shut down when on July 19, 2018 a boat had sunk in thunderstorms and killed 17 people. But there have been people who have scuba dived down there and you can see old buildings that didn't get demolished down there and every once and awhile some old stuff resurfaces when the level gets low enough.
I remember that happened, that was a tragedy
Boyds Corner in the Town of Kent was one of the first reservoirs in the Croton System. It was also the first dam to be redone due to corruption in the building of the dam by Tammany Hall.
In the 80's the reservoir had to be drained for the NYCDEP to work on it. I remember driving along NY 301 and seeing many remanemts of the old building foundations and rockwalls that commonly found in Putnam County. Boyds Corners is relatively small but big enough to see what impact it had on the area known as Kent Cliffs.
i live in pa, and lake promised land is an artifical resivoir, there is an entire town under it and at “low tide” you can see the brick buildings. it’s very creepy.
5:44 is storm king mountain which is Hudson Highlands the Catskills are about 45 mins north of that
If they had to be kicked out of their homes the city could at least give them compensation such as money to move to another place and start a new life.
"The needs of the many out weigh the few."
Except in the US the individual is supposed to be paramount out weigh the many.
Giving up your land for the others isn't supposed to be allowed.
Am I missing something but wouldn't it be cheaper to take the water from further up the Hudson River? If that water is "dirty" you could clean it.
NYC is on an ocean. Technology has advanced to where desalination should be an economic option, and they wouldn't have to trample on the rights of others (but that wouldn't be NYC-like, if they couldn't look down on everyone else).
yes, but instead NYC was greedy and wanted to steal from others because they could. NYC has used and abused the upstate for so long because that is where the majority of legislators come from. So much for Democracy and screw everybody else. In the end though. It has destroyed itself and the rest of the state.
This was all done 100 years ago.
NYC needed the elevation of water from the Catskills to supply pressure for the system.
What do you mean they *removed* trees/ect? Around here they just flood the area once the dam is finished and call it good. The submerged dead trees under the water are super creepy.
They are also good habitats for fish!
Contamination in the water quality, that's why they only leave the building foundations.
That's a lot of towns, I can't believe the sacrifice those citizens gave up.
At this point, trere are 2 tunnels that supply the water into NYC that are literally crumbling due to age, a lack of maintenance, and a higher volume of water then they were designed for. There is a much larger third they have been digging for decades, once that is finished, it's close, they can actually shut down, repair and upgrade each of the existing tunnels.
This is the problem with majority rule. The little people have no rights or protection. Even when eminent domain is used they don't pay the actual value.
"Why Towns were Lost Under New York’s Water Reservoir"
Because the water level rose over them. There, 23 minutes saved!
I love this. You should do the story of Chavez Ravine in Los Angeles
NYC has the best water?! As a Memphis native, and a person who visits NYC annually, Memphis has the best H2O hands down.
Agree as many other places do have better tasting water. I believe they mean NYC has the best unfiltered long distance running water.
i remember reading a picture book as a kid that focused on 2 children living in a town that starts to get moved and demolished to make way for a reservoir
I lived it as a kid in Cannonsville. Watched from the school bus for 2 years as they destroyed my valley. NYC could care less. We called them citiots.
Just pay the people 4-times what their land value is worth, according to current market values, if they owned it 'prior' to the project being approved (and 'at market value', if they were scam artists and they bought it recently, in hopes of making money off of the project). This would then give affected people more than enough cash to make up for their loss, and allow them to move elsewhere, and have some money left over, and prevent scam artists from making money off this.
Only people that had places where they were building the dam walls and other structures got paid, people that were going to be in the middle and flooded out, too bad, so sad. That is the history of what NY politics is about, screwing over the minority for the benefit of the majority.
BINGO & Amen! Perhaps not 4 times BUT a minimum 20% premium of prior "fair market/tax" value with extra bonuses for each year in occupancy. Likewise, stakeholders should be compensated.
For most projects, the land is a minor component of the total cost.
The problem with that is define what it's worth. Houses, land, businesses, going concerns that have goodwill. These are all a matter for skilled appraisers and take a lot of time to figure out. The water board doesn't want to overpay and unjustly enrich someone so they just offer what they say it's worth and no more.
Even in the north Appalachian people are considered expendable.
I have seen one of these in person, I forget which as I was a kid at the time. You can see the remains of homes in the right conditions.
Can you do a future segment about how New York is sinking I'm curious.
love living less than 30minutes away from the ashokan but get yummy hudson river water that taste like a pool and comes out brown half the time while the city gets some of the best in the north east
Gotta love NYC. Screw everyone else and take what you want. Sounds like it hasn't changed one bit.
Did we make you cry, honey? Go tell your mommy.
@@peteraleksandrovich5923 found the New Yorker
@@peteraleksandrovich5923 Can't wait until the country votes to flood NYC and see how you react.
@@Finallyfree423 Yep, typical arrogant crap attitude of someone from NYC.
@@peteraleksandrovich5923 at least when they cry, they're probably getting lungfulls of cleaner air 🤡
Any chance we might get a video on NY's hydraulic laboratory that was in Triphammer falls?
The hydro at the Gilboa dam would be really cool
Nice video with lots of information, although the pronunciations could be better. ( uh-SHOW-kin ) Also, Gilboa was moved but only to a tiny spot on the hill below the dam, and it never really stuck. Only 5 buildings and they burned down a few years later. Gilboa finally gave up and there is no real town center. There is a post office, police department, and town hall. But the residents are very much still there. There is a very nice museum near the dam that has lots of information and pictures of the old town and the building of the dam. It's worth a visit.
Check out Barkhamsted CT. Located in Litchfield county it celebrated its 150yr anniversary before it dissapeared beneath the waters of the Barkhamsted Resevoir
In Kentucky and Tennessee, many towns went underwater to create electricity for the areas in the 1940s and early 1950s. The down my mom was born in, Eadsville, KY, was flooded by the building of the Wolf Creek Dam. 12 other small communities disappeared, too. The Tennessee Valley Authority and The Army Corps of Engineers built I think around 25 dams all over KY and TN devastating over 43 communities as small as 30 people and as large as 1,500.
My grandparents lost 100 acres of bottom land to a reservoir that was built in the 70's; they had no choice, it was condemned and flooded.
Now I need to know where Toronto’s water comes from… but my first assumption will be the lake in front of me lol but I need to know how it works
Nice video.
Saw our house near the dam of the RONdout Reservoir not ROUNDout.
But good job!
Watching this video made me thirsty for some water.
no wonder the pizza is the best there 👏🏻
🤔Yeah, that’s what I’ve been *often* told…
nYC pizza is no better than the pizza shop down the road. The difference being the huge slices and greassy cheese, that makes it pretty crap.
Reminds me of that scooby doo movie where an old fashioned town was submerged in that lake and the guy tried to steal the gold or something
Reminds me so much of the lost villages of the st Lawrence sea way project a joint venture to build a dam to power Canada and the usa. You truly if that water is low enough see the old sidewalks a streets. Its a popular place for diver's to visit. So even have put videos on UA-cam
Isn´t taht ironic? settlers who forceably replaced the indigenous people now being displaced too by a group of outsiders.
It's creepy to think of all those towns under the water like that.
Question: why go through all the effort of demolishing those towns if they are going to be underwater in the future?
I'm guessing it's so that there's less chance of debris clogging up the intakes for the aquaducts/etc. same reason likely to remove all the trees and shrubs.
Contamination of the water quality.
Man that needed up to be sadder video thank first thought
New sub ! Liked 😘😉👍😎
Sidebar, NYC has over 8/9 million living in it, Manhattan alone has about 2.8 million but it’s not the most populated Burrough in the city
Brooklyn and Queens are larger than Manhattan and The Bronx combined.
This great video.
Thank You!
I'm in American NJ Northern area in the mountains I got well water LOL mine's natural drinking water we naturally heat our house also soooo there are thousands of people that still do use just fresh drinking water from well or streams
Ironic the towns Neversink and Bittersweet are under Water Reservoir.
The plan for the Hoover Dam, Lake Mead and the water supply for southern Cal was understood at the time of planning to be inadequate for the projected population that would inhabit the area. There were to be subsequent aspects of the project as the population grew, but that never happened and what we see today is the decimation of the system.