GRAHAMSVILLE — The Time and the Valleys Museum’s next virtual program will be on Sunday, March 3 at 2 p.m.. Heidi Haynes, Deputy Director of Outreach, NYC Environmental Protection Bureau of Water Supply will give a presentation on the Delaware Aqueduct Repair Project.  

The project, calls for shutting down a portion of the Delaware Aqueduct in order to attach a bypass tunnel under the Hudson River, a complex repair of decades-old leaks.  “This is the largest-ever capital repair project in history of the City’s water supply and worker safety is paramount for DEP,” said DEP Commissioner Rohit T. Aggarwala. 

Since 1944, the 85-mile-long Delaware Aqueduct has delivered about half of New York City’s water supply—typically about 600 million gallons a day—using only gravity to carry the water from four Catskill Mountain region reservoirs. The Catskill Aqueduct provides water to the City from two reservoirs in the eastern Catskills which will be more heavily relied upon during the Delaware Aqueduct shutdowns.

In 2010, New York City announced a $1 billion plan to repair the aqueduct by connecting a 2.5-mile-long bypass tunnel around known leaks discovered in the 1990s—one in the town of Newburgh, the other in the Ulster County town of Wawarsing. The new bypass, being connected 700 feet beneath the Hudson River, is the first tunnel built under the Hudson River since 1957, when the south tube of the Lincoln Tunnel was completed.

Since 1992, DEP has continuously tested and monitored the leaks, which can release upwards of 35 million gallons per day. Nearly all of the water escaping the leaks happens near the Hudson River in Newburgh.

DEP has been working closely with Hudson Valley municipalities that rely on the Delaware Aqueduct for their water supplies to activate backup plans during the temporary shutdown as well as working with the U.S. Geological Survey to continually monitor groundwater levels in communities where the Delaware Aqueduct leaks are located.