HISTORICAL TIMES
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A Story from the Archives...
Chaska Water - From the Ground Up!
By Charles Pederson
Everyone can agree: 2024 has been unusually rainy. That’s good news for local underground water sources, which the rain has recharged and topped up. This is also good news for Chaska’s water towers, which require huge amounts of groundwater to supply the city’s needs.
Water towers are all over the Midwest, so common you might have become blind to them. When you notice one, however, you begin to see them everywhere. Visitors from outside of the region sometimes seem surprised to see water towers. Greg DiLoreto, past president of the American Society of Civil Engineers, commented that elevated storage (aka, water towers) are useful in the flat Midwest landscape. “Elsewhere, we have reservoirs . . . up in the hills,” DiLoreto added.
Water Tower Basics
The concept of storing water for later use has a long history. The people of ancient Rome, for example, used the impluvium, a tank or cistern beneath a house that caught and held rainwater flowing from the roof.
The idea of elevated storage came later, dating back to the end of the 19th century. Often made of wood, those early structures gave way to modern constructions of concrete, metal, and composite materials.
Most water towers these days are administered by municipalities (towns, cities), though some organizations (3M in Saint Paul or Hazelden Betty Ford in Center City) have their own water sources. Depending on size, most municipalities have one or more—sometimes many more.
Water towers and other reservoir systems serve two purposes: first, to store water and, second, to distribute water by creating water pressure. Water towers are placed in strategic locations throughout Chaska. The facility is usually located at the highest elevation possible to provide maximum pressure at least cost of construction. Water is pumped to a specific elevation within water towers or tanks to provide pressure that pushes the water through the mains and into homes. The pressure ensures consistent access to water even at moments of heavy use. The pressure pushes the water through large pipes that branch off into smaller and smaller pipes until they finally enter your home. You’ve seen the effect: you turn on a faucet, and water comes out. Thanks, Local Water Tower!
Wood was a common building material for early water towers, such as this reservoir in Carver, once used to refill the boilers of steam trains.
(Photo: Kirk Brown, Minnesota Water Towers.)
Chaska Water Tanks, Wells, and Towers
Chaska has had numerous water systems. In the late 1800s, as a firefighting measure and because no central water system existed, a series of subsurface cisterns were placed throughout downtown. Firefighters pumped the water through hoses fed into the cisterns to douse flames. “Periodically someone was hired to refill the cisterns,” according to LaVonne Barac in Chaska: A River City.
The first municipal wells were drilled beginning in 1936. The first wells had poor water quality, their water being full of iron and manganese. Other wells with better water quality were constructed, eventually replacing the older ones. Midcentury wells could pump about 500 gallons a minute. Wells that are still in use today can pump between about 800 and 2,000 gallons per minute. The deepest one taps into an aquifer—a water-retaining layer of underground permeable or porous rock, sand, or gravel—more than 800 feet deep.
Aquifer Primer
A well is drilled into an aquifer and water pumped out. Dale Setterholm, in the Geologic Atlas User’s Guide, says, “When pumping and discharge exceed recharge, the aquifer level begins to fall. This is like spending money faster than your income provides it—your bank account shrinks.” Aquifers are refilled through infiltration (movement of water from surface to aquifer) or recharge (movement of water below the surface). Sandier, looser deposits typically refill faster than clay deposits. Much of Carver County’s clay soil has low permeability (that is, it takes a long time for water to refill an aquifer). Parts of the Minnesota River valley have a relatively quick infiltration and recharge rate.
Porous or fractured aquifers are often sandwiched between moisture-resistant underground layers called aquitards. Image from Groundwater Atlas User Guide
Water falls to Earth’s surface (right) and infiltrates the underground layers to refill aquifers. Image from Geologic Atlas User’s Guide.
Chaska’s first structural water storage, a partially buried in-ground tank, was built in 1942. This Hill Tower Ground Reservoir was located “up the hill” above the Mount Pleasant Cemetery. Long-time Chaska resident Jerry Lubansky recalls being a college student in the 1950s, being part of the tank’s regular maintenance. After 2 days of draining the tank, someone handed Jerry a shovel, and he helped muck out accumulated iron and manganese sediment into buckets that were carried out and disposed. (Photos: Chaska Historical Society.)
The most common type of water tower in Minnesota is a spherical type that looks like a golf ball on a tee. Constructed in 1966 as part of Jonathan, the tower located near Lake Hazeltine boasted a spherical shape to reduce wind resistance. It had a capacity of 300,000 gallons. The tower was decommissioned in 2013 because of increased maintenance costs. To help offset the loss, a 750,000-gallon water tower in the Symphony Hills area was erected to provide reliable water and fire protection in the area.
The Hazeltine tower was salvaged, refurbished, newly painted, and installed in 2014 in the Village of Cameron, Wisconsin. Cameron Public Works noted that village water pressure would increase and residents should stay close to home as the tower came online. “You may develop leaks in your household piping. Faucets may start to drip, toilets may possibly leak. . . . Water hoses may burst due to age and water heaters beyond their service life may start to leak.” We may never know whether the dire predictions came true.
The Hazeltine water tower was decommissioned in 2013. When it was built, rumor had it that increased water pressure might blow people right off their toilets in downtown. The rumor was untrue, of course. (Photo: Matt Haefner, Chaska Water & Sewer)
Later additions to the Chaska system of water towers addressed further population growth in Chaska. One constructed in northern Chaska, in the Jonathan Industrial park, holds 1.5 million gallons. As mentioned, the Symphony Hills tower supports 750,000 gallons. In 2002 the 1.5 million gallon tower near Clover Ridge Elementary School (also known as the Hundertmark Water Tower) was built to serve Chaska’s residents.
Chaska population expansions necessitated the 2002 construction of the Clover Ridge water tower. The tower progresses (left to right) through the 2022 repainting process. Repainting a water tower takes several months and costs more than $1 million.
“Contractors must strip the tower down to bare metal, then begin the repainting process,” said Matt Haefner, Chaska’s Water and Sewer Director.
He added that water towers are scheduled for painting every 20 years. (Photos: Matt Haefner, Chaska Water & Sewer)
More Chaska Water Facts
According to Matt Haefner, Director of Chaska Water and Sewer, Chaska manages a so-called clear well at the water treatment plant. This tank stores three quarters of a million gallons of water that has been filtered and disinfected. The water enters the distribution system when levels in water towers drop to a specific elevation. Altogether, Chaska Water and Sewer can treat 12.6 million gallons of water per day.
Most of Chaska’s water system is underground and thus invisible—including the more than 150 miles of water mains that crisscross the city. However, evidence of the system can be seen around town: Numerous manholes provide access to the water mains, and about 1,600 fire hydrants poke their heads up around the community.
Chaska maintains six wells, with an additional three planned for 2024. The wells range from about 300 to 800 feet in depth. The wells draw from four aquifers: Mt. Simon/Hinkley, Tunnel City/Wonewoc, Jordan, and Glacial Drift.
Past, Meet Future
Chaska’s need for water has been ever increasing. The towering water reservoirs have played a critical part in aiding Chaska’s growth. They will continue to support the residents and businesses of Chaska far into the future.
For assistance with this article, many thanks to Matt Haefner, Chaska Water and Sewer Director. Any errors of fact are solely the article writer’s.