Laying pipe to bring water from the Cedar River in 1900
Seattle Steam Company in 2006

The utilities of Seattle are provided by two government owned, and five privately owned, public utilities. The public utilities are Seattle Public Utilities (SPU) for the water supply and waste management, and Seattle City Light for electricity. The private companies are Puget Sound Energy for natural gas; CenTrio Seattle for district heating; CenturyLink for telephone service, DSL and FTTH; and Comcast and Wave Broadband for cable television and cable internet.

Overview

The city's water is furnished by Seattle Public Utilities, an agency of the city, which owns two water collection facilities: one in the Cedar River watershed, which primarily serves the city south of the Lake Washington Ship Canal, and the other in the Tolt River watershed, which primarily serves the city north of the canal.[1]

Natural gas is furnished by privately owned Puget Sound Energy, which began its existence in 1886, generating electric power as the Seattle Electric Light Company.[2] Nowadays, the city's electricity is furnished by Seattle City Light, an agency of the city, which owns numerous hydroelectric dams on the Cedar and Skagit Rivers. Seattle first decided to invest in public power generation in 1902, initially handling this as part of the water department; the resulting Cedar Falls hydroelectric facility (1905) is now the oldest continually operating, publicly owned hydroelectric plant in the U.S. City Light became a separate city agency in 1910, and, in 1951, bought out the last of their privately owned competitors.[3][4]

The privately owned Seattle Steam Company, founded 1893, generates steam by burning natural gas and wood, and provides it to over 200 businesses in downtown Seattle—where hotels figure prominently among its customers—and on First Hill, where it serves several of the city's largest hospitals. The company was renamed Enwave Seattle in 2014.[5][6]

Early water supply

The first water system in Seattle is credited to one of the city's founding pioneers, Henry Yesler. He stored water from springs in a tank located on what is now Yesler Way between Fourth and Fifth Avenues, roughly the location of the Old Public Safety Building on the uphill east edge of the Pioneer Square neighborhood, site of the settlement that became the city. From this tank a V-shaped trough conducted water to his mill at the foot of Mill Street, now Yesler Way.[7]

As the settlement grew into a town and city, water was drawn from Lake Washington and Lake Union. Various independent companies provided water to different neighborhoods. The largest of these was the Spring Hill Company, which drew water from Lake Washington.[7] Formed in 1881 by Louis R. Johns and J.R. Lewis, they stored water from the springs on First and Beacon Hills in seven tanks, holding a combined 200,000 gallons. They sold out a year later to a partnership consisting of John Leary, Bailey Gatzert, and Jacob Furth. They began pumping water from Lake Washington in 1884, at the current location of Colman Park. In 1889, they added a 2,500,000 gallon reservoir located at Holgate and 14th on Beacon Hill.[8][9][10][11]

These arrangement soon proved inadequate. On September 24, 1888, Mayor Robert Moran urged the city council to call an election to "determine finally whether this city is to have an abundant supply of pure water at cost, or continue to pay tribute to private individuals on all water used in the future."[7]

In a July 8, 1889, election,[12] barely a month after the Great Seattle Fire (June 6, 1889) gave a dramatic illustration of the limitations of the city's water supply, Seattle's citizens voted 1,875 to 51 to acquire and operate their own water system. In accordance with this vote, the city Water Department acquired the Lake Union and Spring Hill plants for $400,000 (equivalent to $14.3 million today.[13]). These plants saw the city through until the 1901 completion of Cedar River Supply System No. 1.[14][15][8][9]

Notes

  1. ^ „Wassereinzugsgebiete – Seattle Public Utilities“ . www.seattle.gov . Abgerufen am 11. September 2018 .
  2. ^ „Unsere Geschichte“ . pse.com . Abgerufen am 11. September 2018 .
  3. ^ Eine kurze Geschichte , Seattle City Light. Abgerufen am 16. November 2007.
  4. ^ Fingertip Facts , Seattle City Light. Abgerufen am 16. November 2007.
  5. ^ „Geschichte | Enwave Seattle“ . www.enwaveseattle.com . Archiviert vom Original am 17. Dezember 2014. Abgerufen am 11. September 2018 .
  6. ^ „Privates Dampfkraftwerk in der Innenstadt von Seattle verkauft“ . The Seattle Times . 8. Mai 2014. Abgerufen am 11. September 2018 .
  7. ^ a b c Fleming 1919 , S. 20
  8. ^ a b Speidel, William (1967). Sons of the Profits . Seattle: Nettle Creek Publishing Company. S.  256–282 .
  9. ^ a b Morgan, Murray (2018). Skid Road . University of Washington Press. S. 88. ISBN 9780295743493Die
  10. ^ Stein, Alan. „Spring Hill Water Company wurde am 20. August 1881 in Seattle gegründet“ . HistoryLink.org . Abgerufen am 2. Juni 2020 .
  11. ^ Lange, Greg. „Der Lake Washington versorgt Seattle ab 1886 mit Wasser“ . HistoryLink.org . Abgerufen am 2. Juni 2020 .
  12. ^ Alan J. Stein, Seattle voters authorize Cedar River Water Supply system on July 8, 1889. , HistoryLink, 1. Januar 2000. Online abgerufen am 6. Dezember 2007.
  13. ^ 1634–1699: McCusker, JJ (1997). Wie viel ist das in realem Geld? Ein historischer Preisindex zur Verwendung als Deflator von Geldwerten in der Wirtschaft der Vereinigten Staaten: Addenda et Corrigenda (PDF) . American Antiquarian Society .1700–1799: McCusker, JJ (1992). Wie viel ist das in realem Geld? Ein historischer Preisindex zur Verwendung als Deflator von Geldwerten in der Wirtschaft der Vereinigten Staaten (PDF) . American Antiquarian Society .1800–heute: Federal Reserve Bank of Minneapolis. „Verbraucherpreisindex (Schätzung) 1800–“ . Abgerufen am 29. Februar 2024 .
  14. ^ Fleming 1919 , S. 20–21
  15. ^Lange, Greg. "City of Seattle acquires its own water system on June 4, 1890". HistoryLink.org. Retrieved June 2, 2020.

References

  • Fleming, S. E. (1919), Civics (supplement): Seattle King County, Seattle: Seattle Public Schools. This is a public domain source, because it was published in the U.S. before 1923.