replaced and extended to 150 km (90 mi) from the city in 1915, and another aqueduct 

 brought freshwater from the Delaware basin by 1944. The system's 1 1 reservoirs 

 provide apparently safe yields of at least 565 m /s (1,290 mgd) even during the 

 1961-1967 drought. Per capita consumption of water has increased from 380 

 1/capita/day (100 gcd) in 1900 to 660 led (175 gcd) in 1977 (Gunnerson, 1981). This 

 rapid increase in usage of water for domestic and industrial purposes has led to 

 increasingly difficult wastewater disposal problems. 



By 1972 separate and combined sewers were serving most of the New York/ New 

 Jersey metropolitan area and parts of the New Jersey coast. These sewers contributed 

 1 14 nr/s(2.6 mgd) of municipal discharges to the Hudson-Raritan estuary and New 

 York Bight. Industrial discharges were 27 m 3 /s (0.61 mgd) of which 47 percent went 

 through municipal systems. Total wastewater flows (domestic, industrial, and urban 

 runoff) to the Bight averaged 173 m'/s (3.95 mgd). These wastewaters represented 

 about 22 percent of the total freshwater flow (790 m\ s or 18 mgd) to the Bight 

 (Mueller, et al., 1976). 



So-called solid wastes, some of which are primarily water, have historically been 

 dumped on (then) lower valued lands to create new land through shoreline exten- 

 sion, and at harbor and ocean dump sites at increasing distances from population 

 centers. Prior to 1970 about 1.4 billion nr ( 1 .9 billion yd 3 ) of total waste solids were 

 dumped in New York waters. This amount exceeded the suspended sediment dis- 

 charge of all the Atlantic coast rivers (Gross, 1976). 



Street sweepings, garbage, and refuse were dumped first in New York Harbor and 

 from 1900 to 1934 in the inner Bight. However, in response to the garbage washing 

 up on the beaches, a Supreme Court decision forbade further ocean discharge of gar- 

 bage. Since 1934 these floatable wastes have been incinerated or landfilled (Gross, 

 1976). 



Sediments have been dredged from ship channels of New York Harbor since at 

 least the early 1800s. Sewage sludges and acid wastes dumped in the Bight are pri- 

 marily liquid. They contain about 5 percent and <1 percent solids, respectively. The 

 sludges from sewage treatment plants have been dumped at sea since 1924 (Gross, 

 1976) and acid wastes since 1948 (MESA, 1975). Relatively nontoxic solid wastes 

 from construction and demolition have also been dumped at a specific ocean dump 

 site since the early 1800s (Gross, 1976). 



The volumes of domestic and industrial wastes of the Bight region increased sub- 

 stantially as the 1 970s approached. Two changing characteristics of this waste stream 

 posed increasingly difficult problems for what was to become residuals management. 

 First, the wastewaters became increasingly toxic as oils, toxic metals, and then syn- 

 thetic organic compounds were discarded. Secondly, the ecologically hazardous 

 wastes had become diluted in volumes of water that could be treated, even superfi- 

 cially, only at great cost. 



Ecosystems Structure and Function 



The structure and ecosystem productivity of the Bight are generally comparable to 

 those of other temperate coastal environments. Averaged over the entire Bight, the 

 biomass of primary producers and herbivores is about 2 g C/m each, carnivore 

 biomass is about 6 g C/ m 2 , and the biomass of decomposers averages about 4 g C/ m" 

 (O'Connor, J.S., 1981). The annual primary productivity (200 to 300 g C/m 2 yr) 

 organic content of shelf sediments (0.5 to 1%, dry wt.) and fish yields (10 

 tons/ km 2 / yr) is comparable to that of other mid-latitude continental shelves (Walsh, 

 1980). However, the inner Bight has been perturbed by human activity resulting in 

 elevated primary productivity and sediment organic concentrations, diseased fish 

 and shellfish, prohibitions against harvesting of filter feeding shellfish because of 

 pathogen contamination, and other biotic effects (O'Connor, J.S., 1976; 1981). 



The planktonic organisms of the taxonomic groups characteristic of inshore 

 waters are typically more abundant and productive than those of offshore waters, 

 particularly in the apex, which is enriched by organic carbon and nutrient wastes 



49 



