Robotic Mini-sub to Inspect NYC Water System

jhiv writes: "The Delaware Aqueduct, one of the world's longest water tunnels, may be developing potential serious leaks, according to this article in the New York Times (free registration). One leak has already created a pond and a stream with a flow of a million gallons per day. New York city officials plan to use a robotic mini-submarine being developed by the Woods Hole Oceanographic Institution to inspect the interior of the 13 foot diameter tunnel. Previous repairs required four deep sea divers to spend almost a week at 700 feet pressure to fix a leaking valve. Ironically, if the tunnel is repaired, the wetlands created by leaks will be destroyed, causing a potential EPA violation. Additional coverage can be found here and here." NYC has been building a third major water tunnel to take the load off the first two - but it's a fifty-year project.

Comments

This is some VERY cool stuff!

[nbvb]

It's simply amazing to me how much we take for granted our water supply....

That said, I hope there's still water to run through the aqueduct come May.... we're having a SERIOUS drought condition here in the Northeast...

In fact, both Jersey and New York (ever notice how Jersey is the only "New" state that can be named without the "new"? Anyway...) Anyway, both Jersey and New York are in a "Stage 3" water emergency.... and it's only early March!

This is gonna be a bad one.... let's hope the little yellow submarine finds some secret cache of a few billion gallons :-)

--NBVB

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[Sebastopol]

I agree completely, we do take it for granted. In northern california, sprawl is using up the water supply, but no one seems to be putting the brakes on. of course, in Cali, we were already had to deal with rolling blackouts, but at least we had water.

...same goes for New Jersey as you said. they have no water table left due to massive over-development.

that's why we need legislators willing to stand up to mega-suburb developers who don't care in the slightest about resource OR public transportion concerns. just build build build ... a beige landscape.

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[Latent IT]

I wish that would be enough. The city and surrounding areas pull a billion gallons a day. Maybe the little submarine will find a secret cache of a trillion gallons? ;p

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[Sebastopol]

Once again, throwing laws at symptoms only makes people pissy, belligerent, and ready to find ways to circumvent the laws

wait second here: i said we should have laws about sprawl, and you said we should have laws telling home buyers to screw. so we're both suggesting laws, yes?

although, the problems that drive people out of cities are huge other discussion.

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

A lot of people in Jersey actually use bottled water for any drinking or cooking. I was at a relative's house and she was cooking spaghetti. She poured a bunch of Poland Spring into the pot to boil. I looked at her and told her she was crazy to use that expensive stuff instead of tap water, but it turns out that the tap water in parts of Jersey has been linked to causing cancer....

So it might not be that expensive to start up desalinization anyway compared to buying Poland Spring in bulk.....

Tim

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[mr_death]

In northern california, sprawl is using up the water supply, [...]

Oh please -- people use water, not sprawl! A person will use the same amount of water for cooking, drinking, and bathing, whether they live in an apartment or on five acres in the "sprawl". About the only difference I can see is that the evil sprawl person might water their lawn, marginally driving up water usage.

Short of California closing its borders to new residents, you're always going to have a water problem. Millions of people are contesting for water in a desert, and that is not a happy situation

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[Rasta Prefect]

About the only difference I can see is that the evil sprawl person might water their lawn, marginally driving up water usage.

Actually, being a resident of the sprawl, I'd say that around here there are people that probably dump as much water on their lawn as they use for all other purposes combined. Keeping a large lawn green in the middle of the summer takes quite a bit of water, particularly if its a dry year.

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[mpe]

Oh please -- people use water, not sprawl! A person will use the same amount of water for cooking, drinking, and bathing, whether they live in an apartment or on five acres in the "sprawl". About the only difference I can see is that the evil sprawl person might water their lawn, marginally driving up water usage.

Far more scope for unnoticed leaks in a system covering 5 acres of land than with a single building. Leaks in drinking water distribution systems and not uncommon, unless they are major they may simply be left. Unlike a gas distribution system where any leak is potentially highly dangerous.

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[mpe]

Water from the Atlantic off the Jersey shore is fundamentally undrinkable. After all the desalinization, distilliation and purification needed to make it fit for human consumption, it would probably run you about $2/gallon.

AFAIK the East coast of the US is not a desert. Does none of the rainwater come from the Atlantic?

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[ErikZ]

Really? What kind of lawn does an apartment dweller water?

Did you even think about this for longer than 2 seconds?

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[ScuzzMonkey]

Go CLC!

Re:This is some VERY cool stuff!

[Sebastopol]

Oh please -- people use water, not sprawl!

Oh please, let me enlighten you.

Apparently you've never heard of something called a WATER-TABLE. It's how water gets from the sky into reservoirs after it rains. If developers bulldoze too much land it reduces the amount of water delivered to reservoirs, ergo less water delivered by NATURAL means to the storage areas we depend on.

A high-rise is far more friendly to the water table than a bazillion acres of track homes.

Little Known Fact...

[SexPig]

The television show Beauty & The Beast with Linda Hamilton filmed in the huge hole that was in NY's Central Park 10 years ago. This hole was the drop point for large equipment to get lowered into the tunnel being digged. For those inerested it was West-South-West of Delcorte Theater. I think the new drop point is in Queens now...

The third water tunnel is really going well.

[NickV]

The nice thing about this capital project, is it may be the first major capital project that is on schedule. Compared to the Big Dig in Boston, the NYC water project is remarkably on schedule, and is even arguably ahead of schedule.

In fact, 13 miles of the third tunnel is ALREADY activated and allows a little of the stress of tunnels 1 and 2 to be relieved.

I can't even imagine what the city will do when this project will be done... they'll be a serious amount of money freed up for more capital projects. Perhaps sinking the west side highway from canal to the brooklyn/battery tunnel and creating another central park-type area? The idea's been batted around since the 80s. Hmm... Gotta say, nothing seems to keep NYC down.

Re:The third water tunnel is really going well.

[Telastyn]

Note on that site 24 people have already died making the tunnel. I remember reading about the dozens that died making the Empire State Building...

Re:The third water tunnel is really going well.

[dillon_rinker]

Note on that site 24 people have already died making the tunnel
Note also that ~200,000 people died yesterday. Note further that ~3,000 died in car crashed in the US last month.

Your statement is roughly on a par with observations of the dangers of DHMO.

Re:The third water tunnel is really going well.

[Mike Schiraldi]

You seem to know a lot about this .. i have a question: Why is this tunnel taking so much longer to build than the first two did?

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[account_deleted]

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Wetlands and the EPA

[Kymermosst]

Of all the ridiculous, stupid things... a wetlands that is artificial, when removed, is an EPA violation? JFC, things have gotten out of hand.

You'd think that the artificial wetlands WOULD be an EPA violation, since it is not supposed to be there and has obviously changed the area dramatically.

Welcome to era where environmentalist whackos can take your property rights if your water pipe has a leak and makes a pond of standing water in your back yard. Suddenly, your property is a wetlands, and we all know you can't damage a wetlands. The poor tadpoles might need to go find a new home.

And the damage to your land equity isn't even reimbursed most places.

Re:Wetlands and the EPA

[Deosyne]

Yes, but unfortunately because they are also a serious environmental hazard, they are now under the control of the government as well, and will be removed and relocated to an approved HazMat disposal point. I recommend stockpiling lots of painkillers soon.

Re:Wetlands and the EPA

[nomadic]

Welcome to era where environmentalist whackos can take your property rights if your water pipe has a leak and makes a pond of standing water in your back yard

Welcome to an era when rabid anti-environmentalists base their wild accusations not on reputable sources but on the editorial comment of some anonymous slashdot story submitter.

This is important news

[hyrdra]

What I find most interesting about all of this is the statement about repairs being too risky and to just let the thing leak itself to death, hopefully while building a new tunnel.

I agree with the lawyer in this case -- this seems like a really serious problem, with the capability of affecting many, many people. NYC has already had it's share of disasters, hopefully a city-wide water failure won't be next.

I was also thinking about that 1958 inspection, and the statement in the article about how draining a high pressure underground tunnel can be very dangerous to it's structure. Is it possible that a significant amount of damage occured in the '58 jeep tour, when the tunnel is drained? The sources at hand even state the sink-hole was created around this time, so possibly the ignorance of the past and an inspection is to blame for these leaks?

All I can say is I hope they will do something preventative. How big is the risk to do repairs vs. building a new tunnel? Hopefully we will all have water in a few years! This news (including the 12-year cover up) is certainly interesting to know...and it's been going on all along under our feet!

I wouldn't take much risk with something as fundamental as water.

Duct tape!

[Anonymous Coward]

Why don't they just use duct tape to seal the leak?

Autonomous robots == good

[danro]

Previous repairs required four deep sea divers to spend almost a week at 700 feet pressure to fix a leaking valve.

This sounds like a really horrible experience (Working underground, in streaming, high-pressure water for a week.), not to mention dangerous.(Could have been worse though, think sewer, think high-pressure sh*t!).Good thing they have a remote controlled device for it now.
The job seems like _the_ poster-boy for why we need autonomous robots...

Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[waytoomuchcoffee]

First of all, the Corps of Engineers regulates filling of wetlands (through the 404 permit process), not the EPA.

Second of all, this is exempt from Corps fill requirements as it is a man-made water source.

How do I know? Because I'm the one that gets Corps wetland delineations done for the water agency I work for, and man-made sources (like those created from all of our water sampling stations) are NOT regulated by the Corps.

The guy in the article said "Those wetlands are going to dry up and that's probably against the law." Note the "probably". He obviously does not do regulatory work.

Before anyone else on this board talks about "environmentalist whackos", get your facts straight.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[ArsonSmith]

Hmmmm, 404 permit process not found.

please check the url and try again.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Kymermosst]

Doesn't matter who regulates the filling of them, the problem is WHO defines what a wetland is. There is another poster who seems to think that with the EPA, 14 days of continued "wet" area... e.g. ponds, puddles, snowmelt, whatever, makes it a wetland.

While, I don't think that is exactly correct, the current definitions are still absurd, and still used as a way for a small number of people to stop a large number of people from using their own land.

Furthermore, the Corps does NOT, as far as I can tell, regulate wetlands within incorporated areas, and NOTHING prevents other agencies from stopping you, even if the Corps would give you a permit.

I know this because my family has 7 acres of land in Minnesota that we bought 40 years ago, with the idea of subdividing it and selling it in the future.

Now that future is here, and when we went to do that, suddenly it is a wetlands (It is lakeshore property, of course it's fscking wet!), and nobody bothered to inform us over the 40 years that it had become one, nobody gave us an option to appeal its status, and the land is worthless to anyone. You can't even camp there.

The land would be worth hundreds of thousands of dollars we could use it the way we bought it. Right now, it is worth... Nothing.

My point is, that this is bullshit.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[waytoomuchcoffee]

****Doesn't matter who regulates the filling of them, the problem is WHO defines what a wetland is. There is another poster who seems to think that with the EPA, 14 days of continued "wet" area... e.g. ponds, puddles, snowmelt, whatever, makes it a wetland.***

The Corps personnel determines what is and is not a wetland, based on a number of criteria (soils, indicator wetland species, etc.) It is partially subjective, but in your case (next to a lake), it's pretty clear cut.

***Furthermore, the Corps does NOT, as far as I can tell, regulate wetlands within incorporated areas***

Actually it does. It is just that there are seldom wetlands IN incorporated areas.

***and NOTHING prevents other agencies from stopping you, even if the Corps would give you a permit.***

That is true. In California, wetlands not under jurisdiction of the Corps can be regulated by the State Regional Water Quality Control Boards. I guess the alternative is to amend the Constitution to eliminate State rights.

***and nobody bothered to inform us over the 40 years that it had become one***

No one COULD inform you. Did you expect a gigantic Manhattan-project type of wetland survey that traveled across the land? Even the USGS doesn't do that level of survey for its maps. The criteria was, however, published in the Federal Register, for anyone to review that was interested. They even have a search page.

***and the land is worthless to anyone.**

Actually, it is worth a lot to whoever uses the water, both people and critters.

The alternative in your view, is that anyone should be able to destroy wetlands whenever they wanted to. Under that strategy, no one would have clean water to drink (our water agency is VERY concerned about wetlands filling, as it quantifiably degrades the water quality).

You expect it is your RIGHT to make money when you speculate on land? You have a chance to win or lose... in your case you lost.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[spicyjeff]

I believe it was meant as a joke, at least light-hearted. Lighten up.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[1010011010]

Actually, it is worth a lot to whoever uses the water, both people and critters.

The alternative in your view, is that anyone should be able to destroy wetlands whenever they wanted to.

Actually, the alternative is for the government that has taken their land from them to compensate them for the taking.

Please don't argue that the land has not been "taken," because they still have the deed. They cannot use their for the purpose they bought it for, which was legal when they bought it, because of new regulation of that land.

The government has taken the value away from their land, and the family is due payment for it.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Kymermosst]

I guess the alternative is to amend the Constitution to eliminate State rights.

Already (mostly) happened. Ever looked at the 17th Amendment to the Constitution? All state voice in federal goverment is gone.

The alternative in your view, is that anyone should be able to destroy wetlands whenever they wanted to. Under that strategy, no one would have clean water to drink

That is NOT what I am advocating. What I am advocating is that when you buy land, you should have the right to use it the way you could have when you bought it. If some law is enacted that changes this, you should be compensated for the value that was lost. Not being able to build a house takes away a lot of the value.

I'm not saying to let people pollute as much as they want, or fill in as much pond as they want, just that they should be able to USE what they paid for, in a responsible way.

We can't even put ONE house on the aforementioned 7 acres. They won't even budge 1 bit. The footprint of a house and driveway wouldn't possibly exceed 3000 square feet, which is a far cry from 304,920 square feet that is 7 acres. They won't let you fill and build on 0.09% of it.

If we could just put one single little cabin there, we'd make it a vacation home. But we can't even do that.

Furthermore, it is taxed as if it had the full value of land that was unrestricted. Figure that one.

And, as far as use of the lake goes, it's 16 feet deep. There are no natural fish in it, and it isn't any human's water source. There are no natural fish because every few years the entire lake freezes and everything in the water dies, because it freezes all the way to the bottom. (Winter kill.)

Buying land and later being told you can't put a house on it is like buying a computer and later being told you can't put a hard drive in it.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Juggle]

Better send some of those engineers down to Arizona then because we're suffering the same problem here in Yuma.

They build a multi-million dollar desalination plant to clean farm run-off before returning it to the colorado river to meet treaty requirements for fresh water with Mexico.

While they were building the plant they made a temporary drainage ditch that dumps the run-off into the Golf of Mexico well within Mexican borders.

Now a group called the CBD (Center For Biological Diversity) with a long history of winning this kind of lawsuit is threating to take legal action to stop the plant from becoming operational...why?

Because a new "wetland" has formed where the temporary ditch drains into the Gulf down in Mexico. They claim that by cleaning the water and returning it to the Colorado it will put a number of species in peril of extinction.

Of course the fact that this is happening is Mexico dosen't bother them since the actions causing these events are taking place in the US.

And all of this thanks to our extremely poorly written Endangered Species Act that assumes humans are guilty of habitat destruction unless proven otherwise.

They recently sued the BLM to close down over 50k acres of public land in southern california (and won with the BLM settling out of court and agreeing to the closures) to protect a plant that is listed as "threatend" (not even endangered) despite the fact that the BLM's own studies and other independent studies show the plant is thriving and does not even belong on the endangered species list in the first place.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Kymermosst]

Okay, the Constitution, before that was written, stated "The Senate of the United States shall be composed of two Senators from each State, chosen by the Legislature thereof..."

You see, before the 17th Amendment, Senators were chose by state legistlating bodies, thus, the state legislature could choose people who would represent the interests of that individual state.

The idea being, that there would be two opposing houses, and both would need to be in agreement to pass a law. This is a check, and was designed to prevent needless law that wasn't in the interest of both the People (House of Representatives) and the States (Senate).

Now, that check is entirely removed, and the people elect both the Senators and the Representatives, and the people tend to choose like-minded people for both. Thus, it is now easy for too much law to be passed, and there is nobody in the federal government that is the direct representation of the state government. That is, nobody in the three branches of the federal government is chosen by ANY of the individual states.

Furthermore, since Senators have to campaign because of the 17th Amendment, they have to get money, in the form of contributions, thus, they can be bought.

With Senators appointed by the state legislature, they wouldn't need to be "bought", and they would not be in the hands of big contributors. Imagine the kind of campaign finance reform you'd get with the repeal of the 17th Amendment!

The brilliant minds who wrote the Constitution would be apalled at what we did to it when the 17th Amendment was passed.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[armb]

> Haha, by that logic, if I couldn't grow pot on my land, despite having bought it in 1900 expressly for that purpose, the gov't would owe me money.

If you couldn't reasonably grow any other crop on it, and the market for hemp ropes hadn't shrunk hugely anyway, you might have a case.

I'm sure if growing tobacco is ever made illegal tobacco farmers will want compensation.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Zachary Kessin]

Even if senators were appointed by the state legislatures do you think that there would be no politics involved? That the prospecive senators would not be raising money for the party? Or that they would not go around giving speaches to try and sway people?
(Anyone remember reading about the Lincoln Douglas debates?)

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[Kymermosst]

Oh there would be politics involved, but it would be a MUCH different kind of politics.

As appointed positions, there wouldn't be as much need for "party politics" because more than likely, the legislature would pick people who's party is the same as the majority in the state legislature.

There would still be no campaigning, and there would still be no "soft money", and there wouldn't be huge corparate campaign finance donations.

Re:Don't believe BS about wetlands violations

[1010011010]

OK, let's pretend they really bought some quasi-swamp 40 years ago for speculative reasons and not for hunting or whatever. Turns out they speculated incorrectly! -- Virutally all land valuations depend highly on govenment decisions, so that's part of the risk, and always has been. You suggest that government should be the insurance agency for every crackpot land scheme.

It's different, because the land cannot be used for ANYTHING, now that it has wetlands status.

If it cannot be used for anything by the nominal owner, then it has been taken from the owner.

The taking is for a public purpose, supposedly -- protection of watershed, or something. And taking of private land for public use requires compensation to the owner.

Re:*Groan* Go Hug a Tree

[NDPTAL85]

Lets scale back on the anti-car sentiment here. Cars are innocent free ranging creatures no need to bash them.

Re:*Groan* Go Hug a Tree

[2nd Post!]

You can't be serious?

No one is talking about 'a few extra trees'

When they say NJ has no water table, that means there's no money left in the bank... The area is living hand to mouth here.

Water in the ground is like money in the bank. If there's any sort of disruption (manmade, natural, catastrophe, or otherwise), THERE IS NO WATER.

So... you in NJ with decent roads, better and bigger facilities and housing, but absolutely no water. What would you do? Nothing to drink with, nothing to bathe with, nothing to clean with...

Or rather, there *would* be water, but you may not be able to afford to use it, if it's priced like milk or gas :)

Re:Ye Gods Man!

[Telastyn]

I have respect for my country. I have respect for those who gave their lives willingly to better their fellow man.

Those dead in the WTC did not. It is of course tragic, but imo they are innocent bystanders when people backlashed against (perhaps only percieved) American oppression. And perhaps I should be dead with them for not turning our government towards more things like the Empire State Building, and the 3rd Water Tunnel, and away from policing the world, and forcing our laws and idologies on foreign lands.

Great wonders, prosperity, and people make America great; not our Armies and Diplomats. I've respect for my country, but I remember all its fallen, not just the 'tragedy of the week'.

Coward.

don't go int there!!

[wildcard023]

Are they nuts?! Just driving a harmless little robot around the sewer system. Next thing you know you'll have alligators in the street, vigilante ninja turtles and rivers of slime that lead to bill murray driving Mecha Liberty around with a 8 bit Nintendo "arcade style" joystick!

What the hell are they thinking?!

The Great Stink of London

[ajm]

I suspect many geeks would also be interested in this book The Great Stink of London about the Victorian engineering works that transformed London and the Thames. A fascination subject, considering the same tunnels etc. are still in use today. If any code you write lasts as long then ....

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[account_deleted]

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Infrastructure by the lowest bidder

[SimJockey]

Roman aquaducts seem to be lasting 20 times as long as this. Silly capitalism. :)

Seriously, crumbling infrastructure is only part of the reason that I see water getting (comparitively) real expensive in our lifetime. As source waters get more scarce and contaminated treatment costs go up. Plus the infrastructure is just wearing out. And since governments (at least in N. America) seem loathe to raise taxes, the costs are going to be passed on to the end user. Which I really don't think is a bad thing, once people realize the real costs of the resources they take for granted, conservation should go way up.

So yeah, flame me for being a tree hugger. Some are passionate about linux, I'm passionate about water.

Re:Infrastructure by the lowest bidder

[Triv]

Seriously, crumbling infrastructure is only part of the reason that I see water getting (comparitively) real expensive in our lifetime.

I hear that. The sewers (rainwater, not sewage) in my hometown in Jersey are easily a hundred years old.

Because they're underground no one notices them. They're taken for granted. But they're clogged, crumbling and performing way beyond their design specifications. The town could spend a few million now to repair it as they go (say, when they repave the roads) but they're not going to. Why? Because if they did it'd look like they were wasting money to repair something that's still working. The term preventative maintenance don't fly in that 'burb.

So 50 years from now when the sewers collapse and the repair bill bankrupts the town someone's going to say "Why didn't we do this earlier?"

Makes me glad I moved into New York City. Oh, wait...

Triv

Re:Infrastructure by the lowest bidder

[SimJockey]

Yep, last plant I worked at was fairly isolated and had it's own water treatment plant. One system for plant water and one system for "people" water. One was 100x the size of the other, guess which.
An interesting thing I saw in Saudi Arabia (where water is a bit harder to come by) is that even households have two separate water supplies. One for drinking and one for laundry, flushing toilets, lawns, etc. Much less water has to be treated to drinking water quality.
The problem with infrastructure (as evidenced by this article) is that in most peoples minds, it is fixed. Even the people responsible for running it have a lot of inertia to overcome to change things.

Re:hm

[nomadic]

We get our water from the Croton system; none comes from the Hudson River anymore, which is probably a good thing. Let's just say I wouldn't want to let any of it get on my skin, let alone in my mouth.

Re:Enron

[nomadic]

Good. We SHOULD pay more for water, maybe that way people won't keep assuming we have an unlimited supply.

Re:*Groan* Go Hug a Tree

[doooras]

I want a car. I want my car on the road. I could care less what my car wants.

Alligator

[Drakula]

Maybe they will find that baby alligator I flushed down the toilet back in the '80's...

Re:action plan for terrorists

[TheOnlyCoolTim]

I looked on the DEP site for the plan about making a large lake in central Park, couldn't find it... Link please?

Tim

Re:action plan for terrorists

[JabberWokky]

I don't have a link, but I heard the same thing from a guy who is a Geology PhD in the employ of Florida Water Management (he makes neat 3D maps of water flow on both large (Florida itself) and small (around airports, showing flow of contaminants) scale. nifty). It was just chatting about "how bad can it get" during a BBQ, but he's at least in the field, which gives a bit more credibility to that story.

--br. Evan

Re:action plan for terrorists

[Latent IT]

No, not making a large lake. There's a former reservoir (now inactive) there already. Don't worry about a link, check a map. ;)

Bad pun ahead

[Pengunea]

Damned if you do, damned if you don't.

(waits for the forehead slapping and groaning)

So bring suit...

[Ungrounded Lightning]

We can't even put ONE house on the aforementioned 7 acres. They won't even budge 1 bit.

So sue them under the 5th amendment "Takings" clause of the Constitution.

- You have their assessment - and the standard for assessed valuation vs. sale price, and comparable values from sale prices of houses in the area that have sold recently that would be similar to what yours would be if you could build it.

- You also have comparable values for swampland with restrictions from the same area.

So sue the agency that is blocking you for the difference.

This has been EXTREMELY successful in the recent past, thanks to some supreme court decisions relating to a situation in California. (A church camp burned down. The zoning board blocked permits to rebuild for years while considering whether to allow rebuilding at all. The church sued for the reduction of the value to the property (value of property where you can build a camp - value of property where you can't build a camp). The Supreme Court agreed with them, establishing the doctrine of "partial taking".

So look up that case, find a good lawyer who understands it (or the one who DID it), and start a suit.

One of three things will happen:

- They do an about-face and grant you your permits. (You'll have your land value back, less fees for the lawyer to send a letter and maybe start the suit.)

- You win. (You'll have your land value back, less the lawyer's fees for running the suit - and you may be able to collect that, too.)

- You lose and lose on appeal. (You're out the cost of the case. But you have the satisfaction of dragging the bureaucrats through the courts for a while. B-) )

(And while you're at it, think about a civil rights suit: "Denial of Civil Rights under Color of Law.")

hmm...

[supernova87a]

So aren't they not supposed to be posting stuff like this on the internet anymore where some loony may get a hold of it and try something stupid?

Re:hmm...

[geekoid]

why should I be labeled with the epitaph 'looney' just because I have a pet halabit...

Re:hm

[Sabalon]

When I was in college, I remember sitting on a dock on the hudson and some freshmen came down, stipped down to their undies and jumped in, got out, got dressed and walked off.

I think I still have nightmares about them. Ewww...

The phallus sub

[Sabalon]

After looking at the picture of the sub, it makes me think that is the kinda stuff Gulianni worked so hard to get out of times square.

dewater=collapse

[Anonymous Coward]

Expect this aqueduct to collapse about 5 seconds after they shut down the water flow. Given the age and status of this thing, it's guaranteed.

Right now, the only thing keeping it together is the WATER PRESSURE pushing on the sides to get out... It's holding the whole shebang together... And leaking out around the edges... Some goes around pieces entirely, some create sinkholes, some create underground rivers, etc...

As soon as you stop the pressure, those pieces will fall out...

How do I know this? Because it happened right here in Chicago a few years ago... In our zeal to kill off those pesky zebra mussels, some mental giant decided to shut off the water flow, thread a line that would feed chlorine to the intake to kill the mussels, and then kick the water back on...

Problem? Yeah. This particular tunnel was built a zillion years ago OUT OF BRICK. Ummm, the mortar was long since gone. Held together by sand, dirt, clay, some mud, and oh yeah, water pressure! Remove the water pressure, and ummm, well, the thing collapsed... Right under a part of Lake Shore Drive - which then had to be closed off, ripped out, reconstructed, filled in, repaved - all in the middle of the fucking summer... oh joy, it was lovely in traffic...

Last I heard, the engineering firm didn't get paid, got sued, and the engineer that came up with the idea lives in a box under Lower Wacker Drive where he belongs...

Even if the thing in NY is made of concrete - it's apparently in such wonderful shape as to be leaking and it's likely to collapse.

I'd say that the best thing to do is to take the little remote sub through there and see what's what... Then reinforce those areas that are in poor shape somehow... Keep digging out the new tunnel, and when it's 100% up and online, take this sucker off-line and fix it right - maybe relining the whole thing... The one thing you can bet on is that it's going to be a clusterfuck of problems from all the leaking - all those spots will have to be identified and addressed before it can be brought back to life...

Best of luck...

Alternative

[Afty0r]

You know, it might just be because I'm from the UK, but I'm having a very hard time working out why they are building a tunnel to pump more water into New York.

I took a look at the map of NY/NJ here : http://www.nyc.gov/html/dep/html/wsmaps.html and the surrounding area showing the aqueducts and I noticed this big, jagged blue line running vertically down the map. At first I thought this might be a misprint, or an ink leak, but it's labelled 'Hudson River'.

Imagine a river! A huge, great big river running right to New York city - someone had better tell the mayor quick, because apparently no-one else has noticed it yet.

For those of you not clued up, rivers are natures viaducts, they transport huge amounts of water from place to place, always going downhill - I'm willing to bet that Hudson river has more than enough drinking water in it for the whole of New York! For those of you who are sceptical about this whole point, there's also an ocean nearby - far nearer than the reservoirs - now you don't get much more water in one place than an ocean!

Re:Alternative

[mpe]

Imagine a river! A huge, great big river running right to New York city - someone had better tell the mayor quick, because apparently no-one else has noticed it yet.

Maybe the water from the tunnels is cleaner and requires less treatment than river water.

For those of you not clued up, rivers are natures viaducts, they transport huge amounts of water from place to place, always going downhill - I'm willing to bet that Hudson river has more than enough drinking water in it for the whole of New York! For those of you who are sceptical about this whole point, there's also an ocean nearby - far nearer than the reservoirs - now you don't get much more water in one place than an ocean!

Sea water isn't drinkable...

Re:Alternative

[geekoid]

very easy:
drink water from the Hudson, you die.
drink sea water, you die.
Maybe the sea water the surrounds your island is drinkable, but our sea water isn't.

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[account_deleted]

Comment removed based on user account deletion

Re:action plan for terrorists

[Latent IT]

Nah. You have no math skills. The backups combined can put through 500 million gallons/day. The city as a whole uses 750 million gallons/day. I think we can shut off the car washes and not die of thirst on 50 gallons/day/person. ;p

Lets say you reverse-flow some of the testing pipes.

Yes, lets. The flow pressure is enough to feed buildings 12 stories high without pumping. Good luck reverse flowing against that kind of presure over a billion gallons/day.

And go ahead and dump in and infect whatever you want... the water is chlorinated/flourinated and everything outside and in between after all of your happy little maintenance hatches. What, you think we drink the fish poop too?

Oh yeah. And come up with your own insults at the end. I've come to believe my six month old puppy is far brighter than you. =)

Re:*Groan* Go Hug a Tree

[guinsu]

haha, decent roads and New Jersey in the same sentence? Try driving outside of your own state for once and you'll see how shitty NJ's raods are.

All well and good

[sharkey]

But how is it armed? What will it do if it encounters Ch&#252ds?

Re:hm

[circletimessquare]

Poughkeepsie has been getting all of its water from the Hudson for over a century. The water is meticulously checked for every contaminant they can think of. No problems. Ever. The Hudson gets a bigger dis than it deserves I think.

Re:Enron

[nomadic]

There isn't an unlimited supply of potable water.