Reservoir School Tours Summary

Fall 2014

Happy Thanksgiving! Here is what NYC H2O is thankful for. This fall NYC H2O gave 31 historic reservoir tours to 19 different schools, reaching a total of 750 students. Our tours took place in all five boroughs at the reservoirs in Central Park, Jerome Park, Silver Lake, Ridewood and Baisley Pond.

We trained 5 tour guides with the help of Borough Historians Jack Eichenbaum (Queens) and Michael Miscione (Manhattan), Naturalist Ken Chaya (Creator of the Central Park Tree Map), Engineer Bryan Difflley (Restoration Manager of the High Bridge), and NYC H2O Director Matt Malina.

With the help of Melbourne-stationed map maker Rowan Dickson, we created a map of the NYC Water System that includes the locations of the reservoirs and parks where we give tours, as well as aqueducts and the City’s 14 sewage plants; we were able to print the maps on two 8’ x 6’ canvasses with the help of Duggal Visual Solutions. Students get a better sense of the grand scale of our water system when reading a large format map. They also hold it open as a class which allows
them to engage more closely with it.

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