212 COMPETITION OF LOCAL SOURCES OF SUPPLY 



Careful and fairly detailed canvasses of private pumping plants 

 in Hartford, Conn., and St. Paul, Minn., in recent years have 

 indicated that the local sources of supply in those cities equalled 

 or exceeded the total output of the public works. Even in San 

 Francisco, where the city is on the end of a peninsula, and with 

 relatively low rainfall, the conditions for local supplies would 

 seem most unfavorable, a careful canvass by the City Engineer's 

 office in 1913, showed 700 wells in use with a combined daily 

 output equal to 18 gallons per capita daily for the whole popu- 

 lation of the city. 



In the manufacturing cities in New England there are no 

 doubt cases where the amount of water used from the rivers 

 for industrial purposes is several times as great as the public 

 supply. 



On the other hand, if the local sources of supply are smaller 

 in volume and are difficult and expensive of development, the 

 amount used from them may be comparatively small. For in- 

 stance, at Springfield, Mass., the sand on which the city is built 

 is too fine in grain size to permit a free flow of water to wells, 

 and the ground water table is too far below the surface to per- 

 mit economical pumping, and as a result most of the industrial 

 users are supplied from the public works. The per capita output 

 of the Springfield system is much greater than it is at Hartford, 

 Conn. This does not mean that the total consumption of water 

 in Springfield is greater than it is in Hartford. It simply means 

 that the public works get a greater percentage of the business. 



For these reasons comparison of the outputs per capita, or 

 per service, in different water-works systems have much less 

 significance than would appear at first thought. A very low 

 per capita consumption at St. Paul and in some of the New 

 England manufacturing cities simply means that local supplies 

 are abundant and cheap, and are used to a great extent, and 

 that fact is reflected in the low relative output of the public 

 works. 



The Relative Quality of Water is Frequently Controlling. If 

 the public supply of water is not a good sanitary quality, or is 

 not attractive in appearance and taste, many people will get a 



