HomeMy WebLinkAboutMemo - Mail Packet - 12/12/2017 - Memorandum From Kevin R. Gertig Re: A History Of Fort CollinsFROM SNOWCAP TO WATER TAP
A HISTORY OF FORT COLLINS WATER UTILITIES
Laurie D’Audney
Former Water Conservation Manager
Fort Collins Utilities
Christy Dickinson
Under the guidance of Dr. Mark Fiege,
Professor of History
Public Lands History Center
Colorado State University
2017
From Snowcap to
Water Tap
A History of Fort Collins
Water Utilities
You get it out of the hills,
you treat it, you bring it to town,
you spread it out,
you give it to the people,
you gather it back up,
you take it down,
treat it and put it back in the river.
Now that’s basically what we do.
And it’s interesting.
– Ed Hilgenberg
Former Superintendent of Water and Sewer
City of Fort Collins
“
”
6
S upplying water to Colorado’s Front
Range is a complex business. The water
supply must be healthy and reliable
while also protecting people and nature. In
over 130 years, the City of Fort Collins has
developed a nationally recognized set of tools
and policies for water supply and management
that address the challenging conditions of
Northern Colorado. Fort Collins Utilities
customers now are accustomed to reliable,
uneventful service that controls and mitigates
disaster and drought. But occasionally, natural
events compounded by human-caused factors
challenge the City and its systems. These
moments, like floods and fires, have affected
the city’s systems, supply and residents since
its founding in the 19th century.
Flooding and fires are at the heart of the
story of water supply in Fort Collins. In the
1880s, structural fires in downtown led to the
creation of the city water system. Nearly 130
years later, in the context of climate change
and vulnerable forests, fires in the nearby
watersheds continue to influence downstream
municipal water operations and the delicate
balance of urban and agricultural water needs.
Because of this history, Utilities has developed
a series of proactive reactions to crises like
the Hewlett and High Park Fires and the
2013 flood.
On May 14, 2012, a camper’s stove ignited a
fire on the Hewlett Gulch Trail in the Poudre
Canyon northwest of Fort Collins. By the time
firefighters achieved 50 percent containment
of the 7,600-acre Hewlett Fire, a rainstorm
provided much needed moisture on the burn
area. Although the rain relieved the nearby
community and eased concern that the fire
would spread, officials at Utilities feared the
potential effects of the blaze on its operations.
All land use activity in the Cache la Poudre
River canyon affects the City’s oldest and most
pristine water source and leaves traces that
Utilities accounts for in its water treatment.
Because of this, they monitor and protect the
watershed to ensure safe drinking water for
the community.
Even though the good fortune of timely
rainfall aided the Hewlett Fire containment,
it subsequently affected the Poudre River’s
integrity as a water source. Ash and debris
filled the mountain stream causing Utilities
to close its intake in the Poudre Canyon,
preventing the unsafe water from entering the
treatment facility. Fort Collins relies on the
Poudre River and the Colorado-Big Thompson
Project (C-BT), including Horsetooth
Reservoir, as its main water supply for nearly
150,000 residents. The water utility had closed
7
8
in the past, mostly for vehicle accidents in the
river that degraded the water quality. After the
fire caused the diversion to close, operators
relied solely on treated water from the adjacent
Horsetooth Reservoir and waited until the raw
water from the Poudre River was safe again.1
Less than a month later, on June 9, 2012,
lightning struck the dry foothills of Paradise
Park west of Fort Collins, igniting the High
Park Fire. The fire burned more than 87,200
acres, destroyed 259 homes and took one
human life before it was contained on July 1.
It was the most destructive fire in Larimer
Swelling along the Poudre River looking south down
College Avenue during the September 2013 flood.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Jill Oropeza collects a water sample from the
Poudre River following the 2012 fires.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
9
County history and the second largest in
Colorado history at the time. The High Park
Fire displaced thousands of residents in the
surrounding communities and filled Fort
Collins with heavy smoke. The mass charring
caused by the High Park and Hewlett Fires had
a significant impact on the future course of
Fort Collins water management.
After the High Park Fire, a team from the
National Interagency Fire Center concluded
that major damage to the watershed was very
likely to occur within one to three years unless
swift and multifaceted mitigation began.
Along with the localized devastation, the
High Park Fire threatened Utilities’ properties
and water supply. The fire’s heat upset the
soil composition, causing the ground to repel
rain water. Erosion and flash flooding could
adversely affect life, property and drinking and
irrigation water. Heavy rains would threaten
to drain debris into the Poudre River or
cause a flood on the unstable terrain, sending
dangerous amounts of water to the heavily
populated city below and clogging Utilities’
Poudre River intake.2
Over time, the City has acquired additional
water supplies to supplement its water rights
from the Poudre River. The ownership and
availability of Horsetooth Reservoir shares
gave the City flexibility in its water treatment
and delivery strategy when the Poudre River
ran black with ash. After the 2012 fires, the
diversion dam in the Poudre Canyon remained
sealed as the City dealt with lingering water
quality issues. Unable to channel Poudre River
water to the treatment plant, Fort Collins
continued to depend on Horsetooth water.
By the end of 2012, Utilities’ Water Resources
Manager Donnie Dustin announced the
likelihood of water restrictions for the coming
year due to the uncertainty of the available
water supply. In an effort to increase available
supplies for treatment, Fort Collins offered
to exchange some of its Poudre River water
supplies to local farmers for their Horsetooth
Reservoir supplies.3
Water restrictions were put in place in April,
but abundant spring snows brought the
snowpack back to normal, and the restrictions
were lifted in June. In fact, 2013 turned out
to be an unusually wet year—so wet that
in mid-September, several days of record-
breaking rainfall created devastating flood
conditions along Front Range rivers, including
the Poudre. While flooding along the river
was less extreme than in watersheds further
south, it created serious short-term hazards
and resulted in severe road and property
damage. Even with all the destruction, the
10
late 19th century when Fort Collins was
characterized by haphazard development with
sole reliance on seasonally available water.
Like other public entities, Utilities and its
history reflect changing attitudes about the
environment and public health needs.4
In the 20th century, Fort Collins city
officials worked to secure a safe and reliable
water supply through the acquisition and
development of water rights, water treatment
and water distribution. The collection and
treatment of wastewater reduced pollution and
promoted health, and the later development
of stormwater drainage systems improved
the impact from runoff and increased flood
protection. Statewide and national trends in
water management techniques and policy
influenced local activities and decisions in
Fort Collins. Utilities operations typically
kept up with public expectations about water
services and also began to anticipate future
changes that would be required to meet the
community’s specific needs.
Along with economic and social changes,
the geography of Fort Collins also plays a
role in this story. The semi-arid climate not
only contributes to its rugged beauty, but also
presents a fundamental challenge that requires
complex solutions to meet human needs. In
1803, after the acquisition of western land with
the Louisiana Purchase, the U.S. government
deployed surveyors to inventory the nation’s
interior and its resources. Manifest Destiny—
the belief that the American nation was meant
to expand its influence and territory across
the continent—the dream of individual land
ownership, the promise of abundant natural
resources such as precious metals and beaver
pelts, and the healthy arid climate lured
Americans westward.
But the dry climate required western travelers
and settlers to seek proactive solutions for
a basic need: water. They had to consider
where to obtain it, how to harness a reliable
supply and how to manage its uses fairly
among settlers. In Colorado, disputes over
this scarce resource resulted in a unique set of
related laws known as the Colorado Doctrine,
which contains four basic principles. First, it
establishes that all surface and groundwater is
a public resource for beneficial use by public
agencies and private citizens. Second, it defines
a water right as the legal permission to use a
portion of this public resource. The doctrine
also allows for water rights owners to build
necessary infrastructure to move water across
others’ property and use of existing streams
and aquifers for transporting and storing water.
Those who divert water maintain the rights to
11
treatment and conservation. Those responsible
for water supply ensure that enough water
consistently reaches the treatment plant.
There the treatment processes ensure that safe
and reliable drinking water is available for
the community. Distribution superintendents
satisfy customer expectations that safe and
pressurized water will flow when the faucet
is turned on.
The wastewater utility oversees wastewater
collection, treatment and biosolids reclamation
work. Wastewater reclamation facilities collect
and clean the water, return an ample supply
to the river and efficiently handle biosolids.
The stormwater utility constructs and
maintains drains and collection basins.
Stormwater drains and pipes protect people
and property from flooding and the river
from polluted drainage.
These individual utilities appear independent,
but as they embraced more complicated water
processes and technology over time, the water
flowing through their systems unites them.
The history of Fort Collins Utilities reflects
general development trends in modern cities
as well as important individual decisions
that determined its course and led to an
era of water management that required
infrastructure maintenance and consideration
of environmental implications. To understand
Utilities in the 21st century, it is important
to consider how settlers, community members
and Utilities employees dealt with the
relationship between resources, technology and
expertise beginning in the mid-19th century.
Fort Collins Utilities employees outside their Walnut Street
office (left) and at the Poudre Canyon Plant (right), circa
1952. Since the Utilities inception in 1882, the number of
employees and internal departments has grown steadily
along with its water system and services.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H08699 and H08702
#
Area water districts.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
12
1
B efore European-American settlements
in the mid-19th century, various
Native peoples inhabited and moved
through the Fort Collins area. The Arapahoe,
Cheyenne, Ute and Comanche crisscrossed
the foothills hunting and trading and engaging
in warfare over resources and territory. Their
nomadic cultures were mobile communities
that pursued food and water supplies on a
seasonal basis. Unlike the tribes living in
settled communities further south, these
Native groups did not practice irrigated
agriculture and instead adapted their lifestyle
to the seasonal flows and naturally occurring
provisions of their environment.
In this era before the construction of dams
and reservoirs, the Poudre River flowed freely
without human intervention, its mountain
watershed shaded by lodgepole and ponderosa
pine, Engelmann spruce, Douglas fir and
cottonwood trees. Falcons, eagles and osprey
soared overhead. Bighorn sheep scaled
the granite rock framing the Poudre River,
while beaver and Greenback Cutthroat trout
inhabited its clear waters. Whitewater rapids
roared in narrow valleys and slowed to pools
in wide bends. Relentless spring sunshine
melted mountain snow at the high elevations,
bringing seasonal flooding to the Poudre
River's lower reaches until the snowmelt fully
dissipated. Early explorers of the region noted
that the rivers ran full near the foothills and
depleted as they reached the plains. In 1859,
Horace Greeley remarked that these mountain
streams were so different from the eastern
rivers he had known, saying that the prairie
began to “drink them up from the time they
strike it.”5 In this thirsty region, the Poudre
River attracted human settlement and wildlife
along its banks.6
Migrants from the eastern states moved
into the western territories in pursuit of fur,
gold and land, bringing with them eastern
and European ideas about land and water
use based on agricultural practices from
very different bioregions. New European-
American settlements, reliant upon crops
grown for the market, clashed with and
disrupted the established regional practices
of the Arapahoe, Ute and Cheyenne peoples.
Conflict arose between these groups, and the
U. S. government deployed federal soldiers
to forts in the western territories to protect
American citizens and investments, including
settlements, commerce trails and property.
In 1863, the F and B companies of the
11th Ohio regiment of volunteer cavalry
commanded by Lieutenant Colonel William
13
protect the Overland Trail from bandits and
conflicts with Native peoples. The camp’s
strategic location on the banks of the Poudre
River seemed logical to those who did not
understand the magnitude of the natural flood
cycles. Within a year of its establishment, the
spring runoff flooded the camp and forced the
inhabitants to move Camp Collins farther east,
along the south side of the river. In 1864, after
the flood and relocation, inhabitants renamed
their camp Fort Collins, suggesting a more
permanent settlement.7
In the late 1860s, shortly after Fort Collins’
reestablishment, the U.S. government’s
conflict with Native peoples began to wane
with the development of reservations. As a
result, military encampments consolidated,
and the soldiers left Fort Collins. Various
squatters remained and platted the area
in anticipation of legal homesteading. In
1872, the government opened the territory
to preemptive homesteading, which gave
squatters priority to the land. By this time, a
distinct mark of human settlement in the arid
West—irrigation ditches—was already present
in the Fort Collins landscape.
Many traveled to Colorado for its natural
resources like mining and agriculture. These
people dug some of the first ditches in the Fort
Collins area to water their vegetable, fruit,
hay and grain crops. In 1860, G.R. Sanderson
built the Poudre River’s first ditch to water the
Yeager homestead in Bellvue. The Yeager Ditch
had first priority water rights on the Poudre
River. A group from Mercer, Pennsylvania
arrived in 1869 and began constructing
their own ditch to irrigate the intended
agricultural colony; however, the group ran
out of funds before the project’s completion,
since ditch digging required extensive time,
labor and money.8
As the local population grew, entrepreneurs
offered solutions to the intimidating endeavor
through the creation of ditch companies. They
constructed large-scale projects and absorbed
failed attempts, such as the New Mercer Ditch.
In the 1870s, longer canals opened up more
area for farming further away from the Poudre
River, including the Fort Collins Irrigation
Canal, or Arthur Ditch, which was constructed
in 1873 by a group led by James B. Arthur.
14
Between 1873 and 1874, Benjamin Eaton
and his crew constructed Larimer County
Canal No. 2. Nearly 50 irrigation channels
ran through the Poudre region by the early
1880s with the potential to irrigate 150,000
acres. Companies, cooperative groups and
individuals continued to divert Poudre River
water, and by 1881 a local farmer diverted the
nineteenth priority on the river. The extensive
landscape changes suggested these settlers
held the dry western land to the same
expectations as moist eastern soil, in both
appearance and capacity to produce.9
Encouraged by development boosters
making bold, idealized claims about western
landowning opportunities, more Americans
traveled from the east to Colorado expecting
to find fertile soil and lush landscapes.
Controlling the location and year-round
availability of water with ditches and reservoirs
allowed settlers to quickly cultivate productive
farms and fast-growing residential areas in the
Poudre valley. However, the 30-inch difference
in average yearly precipitation between the wet
eastern states and the dry western territories
created new obstacles. The natural stream-flow
cycle of the Poudre River further complicated
this challenge. It collected a higher rate of
mountain precipitation and surprised the
settlers with its impressive quantity of spring
and summer runoff. Together, a surging river
and a surging population were two conditions
for disaster. Careful planning for a western
town required consideration of the climate
and the Poudre River flows.
In 1872, the newly established Fort Collins
Agricultural Colony, with a population of
more than 700 residents, recruited Franklin
C. Avery to plat its new farming community.
Avery, a native New Yorker, had been a
surveyor for the nearby utopian agricultural
community, the Union Colony (Greeley).
Taking advantage of the vastness of the
location, Avery developed the area with wide
streets that ran north-south and east-west,
rather than orient them toward the Poudre
River as the “old town” had been. The platting
also accounted for the Colorado Agricultural
College on land purchased for the newly
established school by local businessmen.
Avery’s influence on early Fort Collins
development also included founding the First
National Bank and serving as president of the
Larimer County Ditch Company, later the
Water Supply and Storage Company, which
built one of the largest irrigation systems in
Colorado. In 1873, three years before Colorado
statehood, Larimer County incorporated
Fort Collins as a town. Platted streets, an
15
16
17
firefighting equipment. In the latter decades
of the 19th century, as the U.S. population
grew and communities became more densely
populated and quickly developed, fires were
common throughout the nation and included
many large-scale examples, such as the Great
Chicago Fire of 1871.12
One month after the Welch Block fire, Fort
Collins residents petitioned for a water
supply system to travel by gravity-flow from
Claymore Lake, located northwest of town,
with the goal of getting pressurized water to
neighborhoods for firefighting. As a result,
Fort Collins’ board of trustees considered
several additional locations for a water works.
One option was to install pumps near the
millrace on the corner of Willow and Lincoln.
Another option was to build a reservoir that
would be fed by the Town (Arthur) Ditch.
The board abandoned this last option because
it questioned whether the Town Ditch could
supply the necessary flows. On May 11, 1881,
taxpayers voted in a special election on the
millrace option, but it lost by eight votes due to
the low-lying location of the millrace and fear
that the water would become contaminated.
The election delayed the construction of a
water works and showed that voters prioritized
quality and reliability of water over the
convenience of a nearby supply, despite the
need for fire protection.13 In a letter to the
editor of the Fort Collins Courier on Feb. 2,
1882, local resident “S.M.” stated, “As to
whether the time has come for water works
or not, I don’t know. But the time has come
when our town must have better protection
[against fire].”14
Later that year, on April 4, a turning point
was reached when taxpayers voted 268 to
44 in favor of a water works 3.5 miles from
town. For the deciding voters, this location
offered close access for both firefighting
and filtered water from the Poudre River.
Civil engineer H.P. Handy steered the water
works construction. Handy prepared a
report on domestic and fire water supply
for a population of at least 15,000 people.
Longmont, Denver, Salida, Cañon City, Pueblo
and Colorado Springs provided representative
examples of systems for the engineer to
consider. Handy and a special committee
advertised for bids on the City’s first public
infrastructure project, and debate arose about
what kind of system to build and how much
money a suitable system required. Again,
conflict delayed water works construction
and the sense of urgency faded away.15
Soon another crisis re-emphasized the
importance of a municipal water works. On
18
filtered through sand. The additional water
powered an internal water wheel, creating
pressure for distribution. The water used
to power the wheel returned to the river
through a tailrace while the spinning wheel
pushed filtered water into wrought iron pipes
that sent it to town for fire protection. The
water works supply network included the
strategic installation of 20 double fire hydrants
downtown. For domestic use, residents could
pay to hook up to the City water system, but
this service got a slow start as the Poudre River
and various ditches satisfied most residents’
needs. An 1889 City ordinance listed water
service for a four-room private dwelling at a
cost of $10 per year.16
The picturesque Gothic Revival architectural
style of the water works building contrasts with
the site’s function as an industrial pump house.
The label “water works,” as opposed to the
pre-industrial term “water house,” emphasized
the mechanical function of the site. The pump
house was a modern engineering achievement
in an era when rapid innovations began to
allow communities to harness nature using
science and technology. The site celebrates the
individuals involved with a sandstone plaque
engraved with the names of City officials who
supported its construction. City Treasurer
Charles H. Sheldon’s name also is engraved in
the sandstone doorsill just under the original
plaque. Debate continues about whether the
structure once included an external water
wheel. There are no photographs of the
wheel, but popular memory asserts that one
sat outside the structure into the mid-20th
century. The water wheel mystery, as well
as the building’s unique architectural style,
contributes to the charm of this late 19th
century Fort Collins landmark.17
After the City met the challenge of water
distribution, it confronted yet another
predicament. In May 1891, the contagious
bacterial disease, diphtheria, infected at least
four citizens. Some local citizens blamed filthy
streets and alleys, along with the new water
system, and they campaigned for the system’s
enhancement. In 1894 and 1895, the City
budget allowed for water works improvements.
The City constructed a brick retaining wall,
enlarged the storage reservoir, added a boiler
room that housed a boiler and steam-powered
pump to provide additional pressure and a
filtration room that utilized sand filtration
and provided the city with clearer water. After
improvements, the property included the
three-room pump house and accompanying
retaining wall, a spillway that allowed excess
reservoir water to return to the river and
19
20
Water treatment and distribution
lured more settlers and industry
to Fort Collins. By 1900, the town
had grown to more than 3,000 residents and
was surrounded by an active matrix of farms
and ranches that took their water from five
major ditches coming off the Poudre River.
After the first water works was constructed
to serve the town’s residents, water service
“became an integral part of life in Fort
Collins.”20 As more people settled in northern
Colorado, the pressure of meeting the needs
of a rapidly growing population drove the
decisions of early water managers. In the
following decades, additional technological
advancements allowed for increased
understanding and management of water
and also brought unpredictable challenges
associated with providing water to a rapidly
changing urban environment.21
With the water works in motion, the Poudre
River watershed became an important issue
for Fort Collins decision makers, and the City
invested in the river’s upstream health. Water
influenced the City governmental organization
and what departments were needed, including
the formation of a Water Works committee,
later the Water Committee, as an extension of
City Council and a precursor to Fort Collins
Utilities. The Water Works Committee was
originally comprised of three City aldermen.
By 1899, water supervision transitioned
to the City Clerk’s duties, officially adding
Superintendent of Water, Sewers and Drains,
with an $83.33 per month salary, to his title
and responsibilities. Council also hired an
Assistant Water Superintendent to aid the
City Clerk, with a $60 per month salary. An
understanding of the Poudre River’s many
components increased the complexity of
municipal water services. Over the following
years, Fort Collins officials confronted disease,
flood and drought.22
Adequate water quantity was becoming an
ongoing challenge. Between 1900 and 1910,
the population of Fort Collins more than
doubled, from 3,053 to 8,210, surpassing
Colorado’s rate of population growth during
the same period, which jumped from just
under 500,000 to more than 1 million
residents. The development of the sugar beet
industry in northern Colorado increased
the population and diversity of Fort Collins
as Germans, African Americans and Hispanics
arrived to meet the labor needs of farms
and factories.
Residential development and expanding
industry strained the original water system.
In Fort Collins and across the state, population
21
22
growth caused some officials, including
Colorado water commissioner Hiram Prince,
to consider solutions such as diverting water
from the less-populated Western Slope. Prince
requested that the Colorado Legislature
provide funding to survey the Continental
Divide in an effort to find a suitable route for
a west-to-east-slope diversion. In 1889, Prince
used $20,000 provided by the Legislature to
survey a tunnel from Monarch Lake to St.
Vrain Creek. However, the difficult terrain
delayed several transmountain diversion
attempts. The first ditch that diverted water
from the Western to the Eastern Slope was the
Grand River Ditch, begun in 1890. Employed
by the Grand River Ditch Company, Japanese
and Mexican laborers dug the ditch by hand
to divert water from the Never Summer
Mountain Range to the Poudre River.23
Additionally, public concern about water
grew beyond basic supply and fire protection
to include public health issues. At the time,
the germ theory of disease was beginning
to replace the long-held common belief
that disease spread through bad odors, or
“miasmas,” caused by impure air and stagnant
water. Foul odors emanating from waste
in the outhouses were seen as a dangerous
source of disease. The turbulence and flow of
running surface water was thought to purify
it, making it safe for human consumption.
Although the miasma theory was fading
amongst scientists in favor of germ theory,
the solution of diluting human waste in the
river still seemed logical to most. In 1888,
Fort Collins introduced its first sewer mains
that piped sewage directly into the Poudre
River. Many businesses lined up along College
Avenue so they could connect their structures
to the sewer lines, demonstrating their belief
that they had created a modern and sanitary
downtown district.24
Even with germ theory taking hold in the
1890s, putrid odors remained a concern in the
community. In an 1891 Fort Collins Weekly
Courier article, Mrs. Mary J. Carpenter quoted
“Dr. Lincoln’s prize essay, ‘School Hygiene,’”
where he wrote, “The common sense of
civilized races suspects them [bad air and
stenches], and there is no doubt that they may
promote debility, headache, loss of appetite
and digestive tone, and general depression of
vitality.”25 This method of contamination soon
proved to be faulty.
The construction of the first water works
had addressed the town’s first priority of
firefighting and the new sewer pipelines
removed unwanted human waste, but
the dangers of unaddressed and poorly
23
the population grew and disease remained
a problem. Local physicians advocated for
improved treatment processes and pipe
networks to combat the pressures of managing
a growing population and its increasingly
sullied environment. On March 4, 1903, the
City Council resolved to hold a special election
on the water works intake location. Six days
later, Fort Collins taxpayers voted in favor of
relocating the diversion point. The City moved
its intake further up the Poudre Canyon, 15
miles from Fort Collins above where the North
Fork converges with the main Poudre River
Employees of the Grand Irrigation Ditch Company digging
the Grand Ditch, which was the first diversion of water from
the Western Slope to the East, circa 1890.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H07700
Poudre Canyon Water Treatment Plant, circa 1910.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H08701A
24
corridor, in an effort to avoid contamination
from users and downriver settlements. The
new water works, completed in 1905, housed
only a filtration system, yet leaders felt that
the purer diversion point was a major step in
improving the city’s water supply. The 1882-
1883 water works remained on stand-by from
1905 to 1916 and subsequently was used for
storage by the City.29
Along with infrastructure improvements,
the pending update to the Fort Collins water
system inspired an increased desire for a secure
water supply. In 1904, Fort Collins purchased
2.651 second-feet—cubic feet per second
flow—of first priority rights on the Poudre
River from the Yeager Ditch for $3,500. On
June 10, 1905, Fort Collins completed the
Poudre Canyon Water Treatment Plant. The
new water facility used a cost-effective gravity
system for distribution, an improvement on the
pump system at the 1882-1883 water works.
Another update from the first facility was the
use of wood stave pipes, which decreased the
friction and corrosion of wrought iron pipes.
This second water facility evolved into Fort
Collins’ first water treatment plant. However,
the public debated whether to incorporate
“mechanical” (chemical) treatment. A 1908
Fort Collins Weekly Courier article proposed
the need for a settling basin at the new
water works building in order to maintain
not just clear, but pure, water during spring
and summer runoff when bacteria and filth
entered the river.30 Water clarity seemed to
be the priority, with purity as the second
motivation for treatment. Because the
source was now farther up the canyon and
presumably provided cleaner raw water,
opponents of mechanical treatment believed
additional purification efforts and expenses
were unnecessary. A 1909 Express Courier
article argued that sand filtration was sufficient
given the new Fort Collins plant’s proximity
to the pure source. However, later that
month, the paper predicted that planned road
construction projects in the Poudre Canyon
would bring large amounts of laborers, “who
would be mostly foreigners,” and warned of
the danger of their “careless[ness] of sanitary
regulations.”31 This fear contributed to the
argument that the City’s water treatment
methods should be extended.32
During this period of expansion, the
number of water administration personnel
also grew. In 1909, the Fort Collins City
Council approved new positions to work
Bingham Hill Reservoir pipeline alignment in the 1920s.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H19505
25
with its Water Works and Sewers and
Drains committees: Robert S. Fedder
as Superintendent of Sewers and Drains,
John Cameron as Assistant Water
Superintendent, Lon James as Engineer
and John Glendenning as Head Water
Works Engineer.33
Months later, the City Council voted on the
filter question. The Council weighed the need
to provide clear water during spring runoff
against worries about the cost of construction
and operation of a mechanical filter plant. In
July 1909, despite arguments that slow sand
filtration would suffice, the Council selected
a mechanical filtering method that used an
aluminum-based coagulant as one part of the
filtration process, along with sand filtration.
The coagulant purifies water by attracting
impurities in the liquid to its exposed solid
surface in a process known as adsorption. With
this decision, Fort Collins water management
incorporated a more thorough water treatment
process. In 1910, to store the greater quantity of
treated water that provided insurance against
a contamination event, the City constructed
Bingham Hill reservoir on Bingham Hill Road
between Bellvue and Overland Trail. This
covered concrete “clearwater” reservoir stored
more than 4 million gallons of treated water
from the Poudre Canyon Plant to meet the
City’s peak distribution demands.34
As Fort Collins’ industry and population
continued to expand, the Poudre Canyon
Plant received ongoing updates to its original
operating capacity to serve the growing
customer base. In 1913, the City added six
new sand filters, which increased treatment
capacity to 6 million gallons per day. The sand
filtration process was slow and the added sand
filters allowed the plant operators to treat
more water in less time. The City continued
improvements in other areas of its water
operations, including obtaining more water
rights. In 1921, Fort Collins purchased the last
of the Yeager priority and first rights on the
Poudre River from Oda Mason for $2,125.35
A secure water supply required not only
adequate quantity and appropriate treatment
and delivery systems, but also a protected
watershed to ensure quality. In the 1920s,
the completion of the Poudre Canyon Road
enticed travelers to the foothills west of Fort
Collins as an escape from the bustling urban
areas that continued to emerge across the
Front Range. The Colorado National Forest,
established in 1910 and renamed Roosevelt
National Forest in 1932 to honor Theodore
Roosevelt, protected watersheds, provided
a lumber source and offered recreational
26
For its existing water customers, the City
already had reached maximum capacity to
deliver safe water in reliable quantities. In
1924, Commissioner of Public Works Frank P.
Goeder (a position first held by D.C. Armitage
when Fort Collins adopted the commission-
form of government in 1913) and City
Engineer E.A. Lawyer submitted a report
to City Council that stated the population
had grown to a point where the current water
system had no flexibility to accommodate
for the unpredictable, whether that be a
“series of cloud-bursts” or an “unusual
consumption of water.”38
In 1925, City budget invested in the current
water system. The City upgraded the Poudre
Canyon Plant in an effort to anticipate and
promote the growth of Fort Collins and
constructed a new filter plant, adding six
more sand filters to replace the 1913 filters.
A 185,000 gallon washwater tank replaced the
original pump system with a gravity backwash
system. The new facilities also included a
new pre-sedimentation basin, a flocculation-
sedimentation basin and a chemical feed and
storage facility, which increased treatment
capacity to 9 million gallons per day from 6
million gallons per day. The Poudre Canyon
Plant also converted to chlorine gas for
disinfection (a relatively new treatment
innovation at the time), installed additional
power generation and built another pipeline
to the city. In the following year, the City
constructed Soldier Canyon Reservoir, another
reservoir for treated water along with Bingham
Hill, near the base of the foothills. Rather than
raw water storage, reservoirs for treated water
increased the volume available within the plant
and compensated for fluctuations in demand.39
Fort Collins added more modern conveniences
during the early decades of the 20th century.
Effective storm drainage was a matter of
civic pride for communities, including Fort
Collins, but the city had a history of flooding,
with major events in 1864, 1902, 1904 and
1923. The construction of storm sewers was
rudimentary in an era lacking defined maps
of floodplains and dedicated staff for
addressing flooding and runoff management.
Early storm drainage construction occurred in
conjunction with street paving operations in
the 1910s and 1920s.40
Fort Collins residents had viewed the open
channel of the Arthur Ditch (also known as
the Town Ditch) running through the growing
city as a safety concern and health risk since
the town expanded to cross the waterway at
the turn of the century. Feasibility studies
were directed at the problem of how to cover
27
28
The 1920s Fort Collins water system added to the
aesthetics of the city by sprinkling lawns
as well as dirt streets to keep the dust down.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H14858
was contentious because it required diversion
of water across the Continental Divide from
Colorado’s mountainous Western slope to
the heavily-populated and urbanizing Front
Range. In 1937, Colorado Governor Teller
Ammons signed the Water Conservancy
District Act that created water districts
throughout the state to manage its water
resources under consideration of conservation
and beneficial use. The new law led to the
establishment of the Northern Colorado Water
Conservancy District (NCWCD), which
managed C-BT construction and resources.42
After the Bureau of Reclamation finished the
Hoover Dam in 1936, its purpose expanded
beyond building western irrigation projects
solely for agriculture, and it began planning
developments with multiple uses. The Bureau
strived to provide the growing Front Range
populations with more water through the
C-BT project. The C-BT project embraced this
multipurpose method of water management
on a large scale, and Fort Collins would
eventually benefit from these advancements
that supplemented its water needs. On July 5,
1938, the C-BT project began with the signing
of the contract between the United States and
newly created NCWCD to manage the project.
Although the C-BT project had multipurpose
intentions from its inception, the goals varied
in importance. Water for irrigation remained
the highest priority in the project’s early years,
while electric power production, recreation
and urban growth also benefited. However,
C-BT water use changed over time. In 1974,
12 percent of C-BT water served municipal and
domestic uses. By 2009, municipalities owned
two-thirds of C-BT water units, leasing some
units back to farmers and using 40 percent for
municipal and domestic purposes.43
As planning and construction ensued for
the C-BT project, wastewater operations in
Fort Collins developed simultaneously. For
29
decades, sewage from Fort Collins residences
and businesses flowed untreated into the
Poudre River—a common practice in most
Colorado cities at the time. In May 1932,
S.R. McKelvy, M.D., Secretary and Executive
Director of the State of Colorado Division
of Public Health, confronted Fort Collins
and 50 other Colorado cities about pollution
from their sewage disposal practices. The
widespread neglect of proper wastewater
treatment throughout Colorado reflected
the cities’ inability to manage the water
and sanitary needs of a rapidly growing
population. Sewage from upstream cities
such as Fort Collins increased pollution for
downstream populations. From 1932 to 1948,
the City designed and constructed its first
wastewater treatment facility, now known as a
wastewater reclamation facility, on Mulberry
Street, a necessary step in the modernization
of the Fort Collins Water Department that
represented the increasing complexity of
municipal water administration.44
The new emphasis on growth planning
required the City to make proactive decisions
that would meet immediate utility service
needs and anticipate future needs. In 1938,
a City ordinance created the Department of
Utilities under one entity with the Manager of
the Light and Power Department, Guy Palmes,
as administrator of all water projects and
City services. In 1939, City Council created
the position of City Manager, and Palmes
transferred to the new position and remained
until 1961. Palmes’ administrative position
was split: Stanley R. Case filled Palmes’
position as Manager of Light and Power
and Charles Liquin succeeded Palmes’
position as manager of Water and
Wastewater.45 Increased complexity in water
management and infrastructure demanded
creative solutions to meet multiple needs.46
In this intense period of modernization from
the 1880s to the 1930s, the Fort Collins water
system grew from hand-carried buckets
1923 Flood, looking northwest from Ault Road
(now Lincoln Street). Buckingham Place
neighborhood is visible in the upper right.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H06528
Stanley Case in 1982, just before his
retirement from the City of Fort Collins.
Courtesy of Larimer County Water Ways Project
and primitive irrigation ditches to a complex
network of water and wastewater treatment
plants, reservoirs, pipes, hydrants, multiple
water rights and shares and an official
government entity to manage operations.
30
T he Great Depression and World War II
slowed life and development in
Fort Collins. However, when the
war ended, Fort Collins, like much of the
United States, confronted the challenge of
providing for population booms like never
before. Postwar population growth caused
many in the crowded eastern United States
to look for new opportunities in the vast
western landscape. The West had plenty of
land but it lacked sufficient water supply
and infrastructure to accommodate rapid
growth. Despite this limitation, the GI Bill,
industrial growth, baby boom and expansion
of the Colorado Agricultural and Mechanical
College (Colorado A&M) into Colorado State
University (CSU) more than doubled the Fort
Collins population from 12,251 residents in
1940 to 25,027 residents in 1960. To support
this growth, Fort Collins was progressive in
its attempts to secure water rights and storage
for its community. The water utility needed
to make crucial decisions related to growth,
planning and infrastructure, water supply,
delivery and treatment that affected the rate
and distribution of city expansion.
3
Growth:
Water and Infrastructure
Management
1940s–1960s
In August 1956, Ralph Parshall addressed
the Fort Collins Rotary Club about his
observations of the changing western climate,
and therefore landscape, over the last 50
years. A professor at CSU, Parshall was a
pioneer of civil engineering and hydrology
and inventor of the still-used Parshall flume
that accurately measures water flow in
channels. Describing the evidence behind his
concerns about future water supply, he stated
that “mean temperatures are increasing and
precipitation is decreasing,” citing the cause
as an “astronomical effect.” 48
As the C-BT project progressed, Fort Collins
continued to improve its local infrastructure.
In 1947, new public health codes required
disinfection of surface waters and promoted
filtration. Fort Collins water treatment was
ahead of this regulation, yet it progressed
further with a new flocculation-sedimentation
basin and a new chemical feed storage building
at the Poudre Canyon Plant.
In 1948, Fort Collins completed construction
of its first wastewater treatment plant, now
known as Mulberry Water Reclamation
Facility, which included a “comminutor and
flume structure, primary and secondary
clarifiers, trickling filters, digesters, control
31
32
33
The crowd that gathered for the
1951 dedication of Horsetooth Reservoir.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, S00325
34
the trickling filter where organisms consumed
the biological material, then the liquid passed
through another sedimentation basin, the
secondary clarifier, and was piped back into
the river. The sludge that settled out of the
effluent was placed on drying beds.
In 1955, the Poudre Canyon Plant also received
additional upgrades. More filters increased
treatment capacity to 18 million gallons per
day, and 12 miles of new 27-inch steel pipeline
was constructed from the plant to the City’s
distribution system. The completion of the
wastewater treatment facility and expansion of
the Poudre Canyon Plant allowed for postwar
growth of the city. It treated the increased
water needs of the growing population, which
would grow even more in the following decade
when Fort Collins Utilities began to rely on
C-BT water stored in Horsetooth Reservoir as
additional supply.49
The Bureau of Reclamation and NCWCD
completed Horsetooth Reservoir in 1949
with a capacity of 156,735 acre-feet, and the
first water was stored in 1951. In 1958, the City
of Fort Collins purchased 6,052 units of the
C-BT system for delivery from Horsetooth.
This acquisition provided a cushion for
drought years and surplus water for summer
irrigation. The Poudre River and Horsetooth
Reservoir remain the City’s two main sources
of water supply.50
Concerns about a perpetual water supply
surfaced in the 1950s, sparking a debate that
foreshadowed 21st century dialogue about
climate change and water conservation. A
1953 Louisiana newspaper article reported
that Gerald S. Parker, senior geologist for
the U.S. Geological Survey, told Colorado
A&M students that “this nation is not, by
any means, running out of water,” apart from
some scattered areas where “water mining”
is taking place and may be detrimental if
continued.51 He asserted that there were no
overall signs of either an increase or decrease
in water in the future. The observations of
Ralph Parshall proved to be more prescient.
These conflicting concerns influenced how
City officials approached water acquisition.
Low precipitation meant a thin snowpack and
decreased seasonal river flows. The swelling
population demanded more water, yet the
fear of changing climate patterns further
complicated Utilities’ operations.
The postwar population boom required quick
decision making in water operations, which
sometimes led to conflicts with other water
users. In the 1950s, Fort Collins purchased
8 cubic feet per second (cfs) of priority
No. 13, the Coy Ditch, and attempted to move
35
Herb Alexander in front of the
Poudre Canyon Plant, circa 1955.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H10254
Ben Alexander
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
to City Council. The board was comprised
of knowledgeable members with a variety of
backgrounds who could advise on thoughtful
and strategic water development. Initially, it
focused on distribution and how to balance
the needs of the community with the needs of
other basin users. Later, the Board refocused
its attention from distribution to supply.53
The traumas of the Great Depression, Dust
Bowl and World War II sparked change
throughout the United States. The lack of
resources during those trying times led to an
increased governmental role in the provision
for and protection of United States citizens.
New projects aimed to meet long-term needs.
Projects focused on multiple purposes to make
full use of funding, infrastructure and labor.
More federal aid, postwar mass consumption
and more young people attending college
changed the mentality and landscape of the
country. As the growing population used
more resources, the health of the environment
gained attention. The creation of the Water
Board in the 1960s improved strategic
planning and relationships with downstream
users. The following decades emphasized
that Water Utilities also had to consider its
environmental impact, from its mountain
watershed to downstream habitats. In the final
decades of the 20th century and into the 21st
century, federal regulation, water conservation
and resource security guided the water utilities
toward more sustainable practices for both
water supply and infrastructure development.
36
Beginning in the 1970s, Fort Collins
Utilities transformed again as a
reflection of the interconnected
functions of water use and community
planning. The water utility upheld their
mandates to provide the community with safe,
reliable drinking water, keep the Poudre River
unpolluted and protect life and property. These
factors required them to remain flexible and
adapt to the changing needs of a developing
community. After the 1970s, regulation
increased and a new conservation ideal spread.
The City’s water supply and infrastructure
depended on sustaining the existing system—
both its natural and man-made components.55
Water Acquisition: Growing Resource and
Infrastructure Management
In the 1960s, environmental problems
associated with urban development spurred
new laws and regulations. Fort Collins
Water Utilities confronted the challenge of
providing water to its growing community
while protecting water quality and quantity.
Unpredictable droughts and floods added to
the challenge of effective water management.
The expansion of supply, treatment facilities
and the distribution system allowed Fort
Collins to prepare for increased population,
federal regulation and unpredictable weather.
Fort Collins Water Utilities’ development
mirrored the ever-changing relationship
between watersheds, water treatment and
wastewater. Adding new raw water to the
system led to the need for greater treatment
capacity and an expanded distribution system.
Expansion of wastewater reclamation facilities
naturally followed suit. These changes allowed
the City to accommodate the rapid population
growth and expansion of municipal
boundaries. After the 1958 purchase of C-BT
water, Fort Collins needed additional water
and wastewater treatment plants, particularly
4
Maintaining
a Thriving Community
1970s–present
Construction of the Water Treatment Facility
at Soldier Canyon provided additional water treatment
to accommodate the growing city.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
37
38
in the summer months when irrigation
competed with municipal supply needs.
Between 1967 and 1969, the City constructed
the Water Treatment Facility at Soldier
Canyon adjacent to Horsetooth Reservoir. It
aided the Poudre Canyon Plant during peak
summer months to meet the season’s increased
irrigation needs. Additionally, Wastewater
Treatment Plant No. 2, now known as the
Drake Water Reclamation Facility (DWRF),
opened in 1968.
The City’s acquisition of C-BT units
supplemented its water supply but did not
totally meet the projected needs related to
population growth. In 1971, to protect its
current supplies and to plan for future water
demands, the City acquired the Michigan
Ditch and Joe Wright Reservoir near Cameron
Pass. North Poudre Irrigation Company
(NPIC) traded the historic ditch and reservoir
for the City’s shares in the New Mercer,
Larimer County No. 2, Josh Ames and Arthur
ditches. The Michigan Ditch system dated back
to 1902 when William Rist and John McNabb
diverted water from the Michigan River, a
tributary of the North Platte, over Cameron
Pass to Joe Wright Creek, a tributary of the
Poudre River. The men later sold the ditch to
Mountain Supply and Ditch Company, which
then transferred it to NPIC in 1908. NPIC
extended the ditch with 2,000 feet of wooden
stave pipe in 1923, and it reached Lake Agnes
in 1925. By 1971, when Fort Collins Water
Utilities bought the ditch and reservoir system,
it needed extensive renovations to reach its
full potential, resulting in one of the largest
projects Fort Collins Water Utilities had
undertaken to date.
The Water Board, led by president Ward
Fischer and Fort Collins City Council under
mayor Harvey Johnson, considered other
options for meeting Fort Collins’ water supply
demands, including investment in the Windy
Gap project, purchasing more units of C-BT
water or expanding Joe Wright Reservoir
to hold more water. After consultation with
A 1963 graph showing Fort Collins’ projected “population explosion” represents the challenge anticipated by water
resources managers and potential harm to the community if they failed to meet the growing community’s needs.56
39
the Water Board, the City Council chose
to acquire more water within the Michigan
Ditch-Joe Wright system. The Board identified
this as the preferred alternative because it was
the “most cost-effective means of supplying the
needs of Fort Collins,” as Fischer explained.
It also gave the City freedom to manage its
water supply more effectively through total
utilization of the Michigan Ditch-Joe Wright
system rather than merely overseeing portions
of the Windy Gap or C-BT project.58
In 1980, the conclusion of the enlargement
project at Joe Wright Reservoir and Michigan
Ditch raised the storage capacity from 800
acre-feet to 7,200 acre-feet—an important
contribution to the City’s raw water holdings
with an increase of 182 percent between 1972
and 1982.59 The City also provided recreational
opportunities at the scenic reservoir that
met the Forest Service’s requirements for
recreational use, including visitor facilities
and a 600 acre-foot minimum level to
maintain fish survival.
From Fort Collins to Pueblo, the population
along Colorado’s Front Range continued to
increase in the 1970s. A 1975 Forest Service
report on the Michigan Ditch-Joe Wright
project explained that water planning and
development would become “a growth
facilitator rather than a growth inducement
force.”60 Fort Collins relied on this very
strategy. In a 1989 interview, Fischer recalled
that the City’s limited planning efforts in the
mid-20th century created an opening for the
Water Board to use water as a “planning tool”
for urban development. For example, in 1978
Fort Collins Mayor, Harvey Johnson, created
the Water Board in 1963 to advise City
Council on water issues, recognizing that
shifts from agricultural to urban water uses
needed interdisciplinary and diplomatic
attention. In a 1974 oral interview conducted
in the Poudre Canyon, Johnson remarked,
“There’s a lot of history wrapped up in this
old canyon right here.” Johnson also was
the longtime president of the Water Supply
and Storage Company and known for being a
“walking encyclopedia.” When asked about
the field of water, Johnson replied, “A lot
of theory … we do not control the weather,
weather controls us.” Johnson served as an
active member of the Water Board for 20
years and became an honorary member from
1983 to 1990.57
Mayor Harvey Johnson, (right) pictured at a ceremony
as he left office in 1967. Johnson served on the
Water Board for more than 20 years, and helped
secure a stable water supply in Fort Collins
40
41
when Hewlett-Packard (HP) constructed
the facility on Harmony Road, many Fort
Collins residents voiced concern about the
city extending that far southeast. As a “matter
of policy,” the Water Board recommended
that the City provide water service to HP
rather than allow surrounding water districts
to provide the water. With the inevitability
of Fort Collins’ southward growth, the City
successfully anticipated the expansion and
benefited from the relationship between water
services and infrastructure development.
The water and sanitation districts that were
developed to provide services beyond the city
limits in the early 1960s, and that eventually
serve 50 percent of the urban growth area,
played an important complementary role.
Known as the “Tri-Districts,” the East Larimer
County Water District, the North Weld County
Water District and the Fort Collins-Loveland
Water District, also exchange water with the
City of Fort Collins, but remain separate,
quasi-municipal entities that are not governed
by the Fort Collins City Council, even though
many of the customers they serve now live
within the city limits due to annexation.61
The City eventually outgrew the 1905
Poudre Canyon Treatment Plant due to size
limitations and very old infrastructure dating
from 1914–1987. In 1987, Fort Collins Water
Utilities decommissioned the facility, which
brought sadness and nostalgia for many
employees. Treatment was consolidated at
Water Treatment Plant No. 2 near Horsetooth
Reservoir. As water left the river at the Poudre
Canyon Plant diversion (now Gateway Natural
Area), it flowed to the new plant for treatment,
bypassing the Poudre Canyon works entirely.
While the old plant was an important part
of Fort Collins municipal history, Water
Treatment Plant No. 2 (now the Water
Treatment Facility) allowed Utilities to employ
advanced water quality engineering methods
based upon the employees’ knowledge of the
characteristics of both river and reservoir water.
At the new plant, operators mixed pure, yet
more variable Poudre River water with the fairly
stable Horsetooth Reservoir water to create the
best quality raw water for treatment.62
In March 2017, a new Chlorine Contact Basin
was placed into service at the Water Treatment
Facility. This $9 million project consisted of a
2.5 million gallon baffled tank that provides
contact time for disinfection of the City’s
drinking water supply. Other benefits of the
basin project included delaying the need for
new water storage tanks, providing emergency
water storage and operational flexibility for
the treatment facility and improving water
42
providers, including cities, towns and water
districts. Proponents of NISP see the capture
of water otherwise lost and recreational
opportunities for northern Colorado.
Opponents of the project fear diverting
water from the Poudre River will degrade the
river’s quality, compromising its habitats, and
require more costly treatment for the City
of Fort Collins. In 2008, Fort Collins created
an interdisciplinary team to review the U.S.
Army Corps of Engineer’s (the Corps) Draft
Environmental Impact Statement (DEIS)
for NISP. The team’s comments highlighted
concerns about the project’s effects on
drinking water quality and costly treatment
processes. As the federal agency that assesses
and regulates environmental impacts, the
Corps received extensive public comment on
its first DEIS and is compiling a Supplemental
Draft Environmental Impact Statement
(SDEIS) as of 2017.64
Trans-mountain water had not been running
in Michigan Ditch in the Poudre Canyon for
two years due to an ongoing landslide in 2015.
Portions of the ditch were open, but a stretch
of it carried water through a cast iron pipeline.
The landslide separated the pipeline at its
joints, filling it with mud and taking the ditch
out of commission.
Rather than continue to spend time and
money on temporary repairs, the City
Halligan
Reservoir
(NPIC & Future CFC)
Horsetooth
Reservoir
(USBR & NW)
Joe
Wright
Reservoir
(CFC)
Chambers
Lake
(WSSC)
Long
Draw
Reservoir
(WSSC)
Eaton
Reservoir
Milton Seaman
Reservoir
(City of Greeley)
City of Fort Collins
Water Treatment Facility
25
25
34
34
43
determined that a tunnel was the best option
to protect the water as it travels to Joe Wright
Reservoir. A 760-foot rock tunnel was bored
through the mountain and new pipe was
installed during the summer of 2016. The ditch
will make full use of Fort Collins water rights
by springtime 2017.
Michigan Ditch provides Fort Collins with
approximately 4,000 acre-feet of raw water
in a typical year. In addition to providing
for our water supply needs, also it is used
to meet terms of water agreements with
several entities, including Platte River
Power Authority, Water Supply and Storage
Company, and the City of Greeley. The
market value of water supplied through the
Michigan Ditch-Joe Wright Reservoir system
is estimated at $183 million.
Construction began as soon as the snow could
be cleared in early May 2016 and used two full
construction crews who worked seven days a
week, including two weeks of round-the-clock
shifts to meet the time constraint due to winter
weather approaching. The project was finished
ahead of schedule in October, under budget
and with no safety issues despite the logistical
challenges of working at 10,000+ feet above
sea level in a remote mountain area.
The tunnel was bored through the mountain
using a custom built tunnel boring machine
and lined with wood planks and steel rings.
Similar to a Fiberglas lining, 60-inch diameter
Hobas pipe was laid inside the tunnel and
grouted in place. The capacity of the pipe is
approximately 100 cubic feet per second (cfs),
the maximum water right.
While short periods of no supply from
Michigan Ditch do not have a great impact
on the water supply outside of severe drought
conditions, multiyear outages could have
serious consequences. This investment in
invaluable water rights infrastructure will
protect one of Fort Collins’ most valuable
assets for generations to come.
Water Pollution and the Cross-
Contamination of Sheldon Lake in City Park
During the 1960s and 1970s, the federal
government’s increased involvement in public
health and environmental legislation affected
how municipal utilities treated water. On
Jan. 4, 1965, in his State of the Union address,
President Lyndon B. Johnson demanded
“that we end the poisoning of our rivers.”
His admonishment reflected the growing
Map of Fort Collins Water Supply System.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
The lag and ring Michigan Ditch tunnel, bored
44
In 1932, the Great Depression hit Fort Collins,
and Ed Hilgenberg left his studies at Fort
Collins High School to help his father on the
farm. In a 1980 oral interview, Hilgenberg
says, “I don’t think I’m any the worse off for
living on a farm and roughing it … I think I
learned a lot of things.” After marrying his
wife, Freida, Hilgenberg decided he needed
to make a living and, in 1939, asked the City
Engineer for a job. Hilgenberg began work
digging graves and raking cemeteries. He
worked for the City of Fort Collins until 1981,
becoming the superintendent of Water and
Sewer in 1959. He was introduced to the
water utilities through his father-in-law who
was the caretaker for Bingham Hill reservoir.
“So the Water Department just kind of fell
to me, and I liked it, and I learned it, and
here I am … that’s me,” he says. Hilgenberg
is remembered for his strong work ethic
and common sense in his job, which greatly
influenced his employees—the current “old
timers” at Utilities. Hilgenberg offered sound
advice when he said, “I think probably as
long as you remember that you’re working
for the public and service is your role and
ambition … you just do what you have to
do, and do the best job you know how.”
Hilgenberg earned several awards during his
career, including the American Public Works
Association’s prestigious Samuel Greeley
Award in 1963 and Fort Collins Community
Builder of the Year Award in 1977. The
detailed photograph collection he donated to
the local archive demonstrates his extensive
knowledge and deep care for his job.69
Ed Hilgenberg worked for City of Fort Collins for more than 40 years,
half of which were as superintendent of Water and Sewer.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
45
ecological awareness of America’s population
increase, well-educated middle class that
created a strong demand for environmental
protection. The popularity of Rachel Carson’s
Silent Spring in 1962, the passage of the NEPA
in 1969, the launch of Earth Day in 1970,
the Safe Drinking Water Act of 1972 and the
Endangered Species Act of 1973, reflected this
growing political influence. It also increased
awareness of the effects of urban development
on the natural resources required for human
survival. Within this broader context, planning
related to Fort Collins water use, delivery
and treatment also began to consider the
needs and limitations of the entire Poudre
River basin rather than just the needs of the
local community.
New regulations on interstate rivers also
influenced Fort Collins Water Utilities’
adoption of water management and
development practices that reflected
regional environmental concerns. Fort
Collins’ principal water supply, the Poudre
River, converges with the South Platte River
just east of Greeley, then flows northeast
into Nebraska and into the Mississippi River
basin. On Jan. 18, 1965, Congress passed the
Water Quality Act that amended the Water
Pollution Control Act of 1956. This new
law established the Federal Water Pollution
Control Administration and allowed funding
for research, development and construction
of municipal wastewater treatment facilities
to prevent the degradation of interstate rivers.
The bill summed up the program for water
pollution control and stated: “water pollution
results from a man’s use of a stream to carry
away his wastes in the cheapest (to the
polluter) possible manner and from natural
events: such as erosion … most events leading
to pollution of a river are interrelated … the
logical approach to the control or prevention
is on the river basin or watershed unit.”65
The Water Quality Act of 1965, amended
again in 1972 to create the Clean Water Act,
explicitly defined rivers as interrelated systems
that required consideration of the various
factors present in their basins and various
uses. As a tributary of an interstate waterway,
the Poudre River fell under the purview of
the newly-created Water Pollution Control
Administration.66
Because the municipal water system is
interconnected with the river, water quality
legislation affected all divisions within Fort
Collins Water Utilities. Chemical additives
to ensure healthy drinking water ended up
in the wastewater, which received additional
treatment at the reclamation facility before
46
requiring specific professional certifications
and expertise for incoming managers,
along with increased regulatory oversight
of operations.68
In the late 1970s, a pollution problem
and consequent public relations incident
challenged the water utility’s good reputation
in the community. In July 1977, the City
detected bacteria in drinking water after the
surrounding City Park neighborhood voiced
complaints of cloudy water, odor and health
issues ranging from nausea to high fever.
Local residents felt the water utility did not
communicate effectively with the public.
Although the utility was state-of-the-art and
had earned public confidence, it still lacked
an in-house laboratory, which led to a delayed
response to the incident.
The water utility sent samples to Denver,
which required a 3-10 day wait for results. This
inefficient system created frustration for both
the utility’s employees and the community. The
Triangle Review, a local newspaper, reported
that the City failed to contact the Larimer
County Health Department and the press.
Larimer County Health Director Dr. Robert
Sherwood reflected his confidence in the City
when he stated, “One of the last things you’d
suspect would be a City water supply.”70 The
bacteria appeared in sporadic testing results.
After weeks of confusion and frustration,
on Aug. 15, 1977, the water utility identified
the source as a cross-contamination between
City domestic supply lines and the Sheldon
Lake lines used to irrigate City Park. Dr. Keith
Elmund, former Environmental Services
Division Manager, had been working as a
Pollution Control Lab Technician for only
four months when the cross-contamination
occurred. He remembered that Roger Krempel,
Director of Public Works, disconnected the
pipe and threw it into Sheldon Lake, that
caused the contamination. This incident
demonstrated how seriously some employees
took their responsibility to protect the health of
their fellow Fort Collins residents. Fort Collins
began to cope with the complex problem
of regulating water quality and distribution
with reliable infrastructure, which caused
the water utility to react progressively to
meet the community’s needs.71
With this incident, the water utility
successfully confronted a management
challenge by adopting revolutionary changes.
It accelerated the Water Quality Control
Division’s ability to test water samples
in-house. This new state-of-the-art division
performed City and state-level testing and
eliminated the need to send samples to CSU
47
The Anheuser-Busch complex processes produce
waste that required additional treatment before effluent
could be released back into the Poudre River.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, T00210
48
or Denver. Now the City had the capability
to test bacterial contamination every time
there was a complaint and deliver results
within hours, rather than days or weeks, and
increase mitigation if necessary. The division
also set up a customer service hotline for Fort
Collins residents to report complaints and
request water testing in an efficient manner.
The important services managed by the water
utility became more evident to the public,
and its proactive approach to improvement
contributed to its positive reputation. City
employees managed the situation with public
health and safety as the goal, and the utility
emerged from the City Park controversy with
a proactive Water Quality Control Lab and
improved customer service.72
Fort Collins Water Utilities continually
reassessed its water supply and wastewater
treatment needs in response to its growing
industrial and residential sectors. Growth
brought in more revenue but also produced
more waste that required treatment. In the
mid-1980s, while the City worked behind
the scenes to secure the construction of an
Anheuser-Busch (A-B) plant along I-25, it
presented a sizable challenge for the
wastewater utility. To obtain the 4,200 acre-
feet it would need for brewery operations,
A-B signed a three-way agreement with the
City and Platte River Power Authority (Platte
River) to use water from the newly completed
Windy Gap Project. According to the terms
of the agreement, Fort Collins uses and
treats between 6,000 and 8,000 acre-feet of
reusable water from Water Supply and Storage
Company (WSSC) and the Michigan Ditch-Joe
Wright Reservoir system in order to produce
4,200 acre-feet of reusable effluent. Platte River
uses the effluent at the Rawhide Power Plant
and repays the City with 4,200-acre-feet of
Windy Gap water intended for the A-B plant.
The A-B effluent is subsequently reused via
land application. The City also returns 1,890
acre-feet of C-BT water to WSSC in exchange
for use of the transmountain WSSC water.
The overall benefit to the City of these
complicated exchanges is about 2,300 acre-
feet of water per year.
In addition to the need for a reliable, high-
quality water supply, A-B also produced large
amounts of chemical waste that put pressure
on the existing infrastructure and required
pretreatment before it mixed with other
domestic, business and industrial wastewater.
Two years later in 1987, the wastewater utility
began its largest improvement projects to
date, totaling $30 million, with expansions
at both the DWRF and Water Treatment
49
After a severe drought in 1977, Fort Collins
Water Utilities hired Molly Nortier as its
first water conservation officer. Originally
a part-time position, Nortier educated the
community on smart water use. Nortier also
was the editor of the water utility’s monthly
employee Pipelines newsletter where her
sense of humor and commitment to both
water and people showed. Known as the
“party girl” around the office, Nortier planned
celebrations for retiring employees and other
special occasions and also served as the
Water Board secretary. Molly Nortier and Mike
Smith co-wrote the 1982 utilities history,
From Bucket to Basin, a treasured story by
many Utilities employees.77
Molly Nortier was the first water conservation officer in 1977.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
of municipal biosolids from the wastewater
reclamation facilities.74 Sludge and biosolids
are synonymous terms for the organic solid
waste removed from the effluent, or liquid
wastewater. At the Resource Recovery Farm,
dried sludge was used to fertilize crops that
would not end up in the human food chain.
The high cost of sludge disposal led Fort
Collins, along with many other cities around
the country, to explore this method of waste
disposal. The experiment was so successful
that in 1990 the City bought the 26,000-acre
Meadow Springs Ranch near the Wyoming
border to expand its sludge reclamation work.75
Water Conservation and Metering
Awareness of the positive benefits of water
conservation also influenced City management
decisions in the late 20th century. Throughout
its history, the aggressive acquisition of
water rights set Fort Collins apart from other
municipalities, but environmentalism and
drought conditions shifted the approach
from acquisition to conservation. Through
50
the mid-1960s and 1970s, federal and state
governments passed increasing regulations
in response to booming urban and suburban
populations. More people inhabited already
densely populated areas and relied on
existing natural resources and public services.
Additionally, severe drought nationwide
further encouraged a growing environmental
awareness in this era. Water conservation
again became a prominent topic. Conservation
influenced how Fort Collins Water Utilities
maintained a safe and reliable municipal
water supply, contributed to determinations
regarding the size of plant expansions, guided
water rates, and even affected wastewater
treatment and the effluent returned to the
Poudre River.
The drought was a reminder of the need to
face the challenges of urban growth in the
city. Acquiring water shares from local ditch
companies provided more water for the
increasing municipal customer base, but it
also required the construction of reservoirs to
store the water for use during drought years.
A related program relied on the community’s
water conservation efforts to create a supply
buffer. A 1965 City ordinance had passed
to prohibit waste of municipal water while
sprinkling lawns and gardens, but a larger
conservation awareness program was still
needed. Facing a particularly difficult drought
in 1977, Fort Collins Water Utilities hired
its first water conservation officer, Molly
Nortier, to focus on encouraging conservation
awareness and practices. While this was a
part-time position until 1990, it provided
momentum for identifying opportunities
and techniques residents could use to reduce
household demand.
The Fort Collins community also began
to discuss metering as a possible water
conservation tool in the 1970s. Metering to
reduce the overall volume of water use offered
the promise of reducing costs associated with
acquiring additional raw water supply, as well
as reducing costs associated with expanding
water treatment needs. Some saw metering
as a method for creating economic equity—
those who used more water would pay for
their use and those who conserved would no
longer subsidize water consumption for their
neighbors. It would not restrict household
water use, but rather allow residents to
monitor their monthly water usage. Metering
was not without precedent on the Front
Range. Boulder adopted it in 1963 and saw up
to 33 percent savings in water usage. In the
1970s, the water utility thoroughly researched
conservation practices and water metering.
51
Purchasing water shares for long-term
municipal needs had long been a staple
of the Fort Collins water management
philosophy. While acquisition remained a core
strategy, water conservation and a balanced
management approach began to challenge that
longstanding practice. Two basic questions
drove the debate: “Should the City acquire
more water rights and secure a substantial raw
water supply while affordable opportunities to
do so were within reach?” or, “Should the City
invest in the installation and implementation
of universal metering to maximize efficient use
of the current water supply?”
The Water Board included both pro- and
anti-metering members. Some opponents
worried that residents conscious of their water
usage would water their lawns less, causing the
city’s lawns, gardens and large trees to die and
degrade Fort Collins’ aesthetic environment
and overall quality of life. Some members
balked at the multimillion dollar price tag
for meter installation while others argued
that metering would negate the benefit of the
City’s senior water rights because without
reservoirs to store conserved water, it would
simply flow to downstream users. Raymond L.
Anderson, a resource economist at CSU and
Water Board member who opposed metering,
believed that meters were unnecessary because
Fort Collins had “ample raw water supplies to
serve the city.” He also argued that metering
in cities such as Boulder led to brown lawns
and that the City should invest instead in
additional water storage options to meet
future demands.78 While some members of
the Water Board and City Council agreed with
Anderson, the general debate also reflected
an understanding that metering would be
unavoidable eventually. Opponents believed
that delaying the process would make more
funds available for raw water purchase in the
short term.79
The argument that the City could not afford
to simultaneously pursue both water rights
acquisition and meter installation led to
decades of delay, so universal metering in
Fort Collins was achieved incrementally.
City Council passed an ordinance during
the 1977 drought requiring meter yoke
installation in all newly constructed homes.
But by 1985, only 200 homes inside city
limits, 900 outside the limits and less than
5,000 commercial and multifamily units
were metered. A consultant hired by the City
estimated that unmetered flat rate residential
customers were using 25 to 50 percent more
water than the metered customers.
City Council first adopted a Water Supply
52
the City finally instituted a universal metering
program that began on a volunteer basis
and transitioned to mandatory metering to
meet legislation mandates by 2005. Poking
fun at the inevitability of water metering, a
1999 Fort Collins Coloradoan article stated,
“Nothing’s certain in life except death, taxes
and water meters.”80
Also in 1997, Fort Collins Water Utilities
merged with Fort Collins Light and Power
to create Fort Collins Utilities. The combined
services area, now the largest in the City,
had water, wastewater, stormwater and the
electric utilities.
Another drought in 2002 validated the need
for further conservation measures. In 2003, the
two existing policies were combined to form
the Water Supply and Demand Management
Policy (WSDMP). The policy included water
use goals to be achieved by 2010, including
reducing water use to 185 gallons per capita
per day (gpcd) for annual water consumption
and 475 gallons per capita for peak daily
demand. It also recommended that the City
pursue additional storage capacity, maintain
a water supply shortage response plan, make
use of surplus raw water and protect its quality,
foster regional cooperation and encourage
stream flow protection for ecological and
recreational benefits.
The State of Colorado Water Conservation
Act of 2004 became the next standard for
compliance and the City adopted a new Water
Conservation Plan (WCP) in 2010 to reflect
its guidelines. As of November 2012, when the
City adopted Resolution 2012-099, a revised
WSDMP, the reduction goals decreased further
to 140 gpcd and 350 gallons per capita
for peak daily demand by 2020. The policy
also addressed inherent uncertainties in
water supply planning for a rapidly growing
city by setting the water supply planning
demand level slightly higher at 150 gpcd,
which the City uses to plan for acquisitions.
To achieve these more aggressive goals,
the City expanded the permanent water
conservation staff to three full-time positions
who would, among other tasks, continue to
develop targeted educational components and
public information campaigns directed at the
specific water use practices of both residential
and commercial customers.81
Domestic water savings also resulted from
the availability of more efficient plumbing
fixtures, including 1.6-gallons-per-flush toilets,
2.5-gallons-per-minute showerheads, and
2-gallons-per-minute faucets. To promote
consumer awareness of products that offer a
20 percent efficiency improvement, Fort
53
occurred, the City and the nearby districts had
in place to cope with the challenge. Rebate
programs for high-efficiency appliances, the
Zero Interest Loans for Conservation Help
(ZILCH) program to assist customers with
service, and replacement of water lines and
the purchase of efficient appliances and
sprinkler system audits created additional
support for residents to improve water
conservation at home.
The “Utility for the 21st Century”
sustainability plan, completed in 2009,
attempted to fulfill customer expectations
“within the context of being a developer of
natural resources and a steward of natural
resources.” A sustainability team comprised
of Utilities employees, stakeholders and
R.W. Beck consultants, developed the
plan, providing a tangible path toward the
challenging goal of sustainability through
green building programs, residential and
commercial water and energy efficiency plans,
and increased metering technology. Utilities
and water district customers widely accepted
the necessity of conservation practices and
City-sponsored programs established in the
late 1990s and early 2000s helped the overall
conservation program continue to gain
momentum and shift the community to a
water-wise culture.84
In 2015, Water Conservation staff began work
on an updated Water Conservation Plan, now
titled the Water Efficiency Plan (WEP). The
draft WEP was developed with input from
City boards and commissions, community
organizations and a technical advisory group
that included Utilities staff, City staff and
Water Board members. The WEP provides
goals, indicators, and implementation
principles that will guide and prioritize
activities undertaken by the Utilities Water
Conservation Team. The update was timed to
support the Budgeting for Outcomes (BFO)
process and the WEP aligns with related
efforts, including the Colorado Water Plan
and the Fort Collins Climate Action Plan
framework. The WEP was approved and
adopted by the Fort Collins City Council
on March 1, 2016 (Resolution 2016-023) and
was submitted to the CWCB for State approval
in early 2017.
The new WEP changes the existing 140 gpcd
by 2020 goal to 130 gpcd by 2030. Also,
the WEP identifies areas of opportunity for
expansion of water conservation programs
that are selected for their significant water
savings potential, the potential scope of
customer impact and in alignment with the
City’s Strategic Plan Outcome and Objectives.
54
8
City of Fort Collins Utilities
Citywide Problem Map - North
E VINE DR
INTERSTATE 25
E PROSPECT RD
LAPORTE AVE
N TAFT HILL RD
N SHIELDS ST
W VINE DR
E MULBERRY ST
W MULBERRY ST
W PROSPECT RD
E COUNTY ROAD 52
S LEMAY AVE
S SHIELDS ST
S TAFT HILL RD
E LINCOLN AVE
RIVERSIDE AVE
N COLLEGE AVE
S COLLEGE AVE
S TIMBERLINE RD
S OVERLAND TRL
N OVERLAND TRL
N LEMAY AVE
N US HIGHWAY 287
N COUNTY ROAD 9
COUNTY ROAD 54G
TERRY LAKE RD
N COUNTY ROAD 11
COUNTRY CLUB RD
N TIMBERLINE RD
E WILLOX LN
GREGORY RD
W WILLOX LN
S SUMMIT VIEW DR
9TH ST
E COUNTY ROAD 50
JEFFERSON ST
INTERSTATE 25
N OVERLAND TRL
Lake Canal
New Mercer Canal
Spring Creek
Boxelder Creek
Terry Lake
Long Pond
Arthur Canal
Cache La Poudre Res. Inlet
Sherwood Lateral
Lindenmeier Lake
Richard’s Lake
Lee Lake
Boxelder Creek
Legend
High Risk Floodplain
Moderate Risk Floodplain
Depth of Overtopping
0−1
55
The City also made several failed attempts
to create a special district for stormwater
management, but City Council continued to
advocate for a stronger approach to drainage
management. In 1979, Fort Collins entered
the National Flood Insurance Program and
adopted its first floodplain regulations. City
officials moved forward with a groundbreaking
fee-based program to support the stormwater
utility. In 1980, City Council adopted the
stormwater utility fee with the passage of
Article VII of the Fort Collins Municipal
Code. The new fee allowed all stormwater
management to be consolidated into one
stormwater utility to operate and maintain the
stormwater system for the City and develop
capital improvement projects that would
reduce flood risk.85
With the major components of an effective
stormwater utility in place, the 1980s was a
decade of progress for flood control. To support
the new utility, residents began to pay monthly
stormwater fees in 1981. Monthly stormwater
capital improvement and development fees
began in the following year. In 1984, the City
also adopted new flood mitigation design
criteria and construction standards that would
guide all development to the present and
allow the full maturation of a comprehensive
flood management program for Fort Collins.
Although the City was just beginning to
address the backlogged improvement needs
in older developments, other cities began to
recognize and emulate its cutting edge model
for stormwater management.86
Expanding upon the immediate goal to protect
human life and property, the City then turned
to the impact of stormwater on habitat and
downstream communities with the adoption
of the “Watershed Approach to Stormwater
Quality” in 1995. The management method
improved wildlife habitat and water quality
by raising community awareness about
stormwater system design. Residents learned
that stormwater runoff brought pollution from
the community to the streams as it washed
over roofs, roads, yards and debris along
its path. Community members began
to understand that the city itself was part
of the watershed and became more conscious
of the built environment’s relationship to
the natural environment.87
In the mid-1990s, the population of Fort
Collins hit 100,000 and more people than
ever lived and worked in the floodplain. By
1996, the City’s mitigation efforts had earned
a Class 6 rating in the Federal Emergency
Management Agency’s (FEMA) Community
Rating System (CRS), which recognizes efforts
56
enhancement, while continuing the goal of
public safety and reduced flood damages. In
2012, Utilities began to update the Stormwater
Master Plan with a “watershed approach” to
improve stormwater quality in anticipation
of increasingly stringent federal water quality
regulations. The update also addressed the
need to rehabilitate urban streams with
unstable banks and erosion problems,
which have public safety and ecological
consequences.90
While City officials understood the ongoing
danger of flooding and worked to prevent
another major disaster like the 1997 flood, a
long period of drought and the fires of 2012
created temporary complacency about the
flooding danger in the general population.
On Sept. 9, 2013, a convective rain storm over
northern Colorado’s Front Range began to drop
precipitation that would continue for a week,
washing away roads and bridges and leaving a
wake of destruction in multiple communities.
The flood devastated nearby communities
of Estes Park, Drake, Lyons and sections of
Loveland, Greeley and Boulder, but Fort Collins
was fortunate. It was only a 50-year flood on
the Poudre River, even though peak flow at the
mouth of the canyon on Sept. 13 at 3:45 a.m.
was 10,400 cfs. In the Poudre River watershed,
nearly 12 inches of rain fell in certain areas. But
by comparison to neighboring communities in
Larimer, Boulder and Weld counties, damage
to infrastructure and homes in Fort Collins was
minimal. The upstream reservoirs, Halligan
and Seaman, happened to be relatively empty
at the time and were able to serve unexpectedly
as storage for the excess flow, and the flood
conditions grew slowly enough to allow water
managers time to react. Rainfall quantity was
lighter in Fort Collins than in communities
farther south, and the city also benefited from
measures that Utilities had implemented since
the 1997 flood. All of these factors meant that
the 2013 flood had a much less serious impact
on Fort Collins than other communities and
also was far less severe in terms of overall
impact than the 1997 flood.91
Stormwater and floodplain management in
Fort Collins changed fairly radically between
1997 and 2013. The stormwater utility’s
professional staff grew in size and expertise
and adopted the Incident Command System
(ICS), developed in the fire management
profession, to respond to emergency events.
Flood management projects constructed
between 1999 and 2012 reduced flood impact
in several areas along the Poudre River basin.
In 2004, the City constructed the earthen
Oxbow Levee from Linden Street south to
57
for the Poudre River basin that banned
floatable materials such as metal drums,
storage tanks, pallets, vehicles and construction
supplies. This standard was a critical
mitigating factor in the 2013 flood, particularly
along the Lincoln Avenue corridor where
all properties were in compliance before
the flood occurred.94
The Fort Collins Flood Warning System
(FWS), a network of 75 rainfall and
streamflow gauges, was critical for monitoring
the flood event and identifying neighborhoods
and structures that might be at risk so
that emergency responders and Utilities
officials could take preventative measures
and notify the public.95
Finally, despite some degree of drought-
inspired complacency, the citizens of Fort
Collins benefited from ongoing educational
public outreach regarding flood awareness
and safety procedures in both standard media
outlets and via social media using the City’s
Facebook, YouTube and Twitter accounts. The
ability to make instant contact with customers
who also could easily share information with
each other was a great advantage over disaster
response efforts in the previous century.
During the 2013 flood, local residents received
a constant broadcast of information and, in
turn, shared that information with others. The
City also set up a special storm information
website for the 2013 flood that served as a
central informational hub, including links
to interactive GIS maps with precipitation
information and flood-related photographs.
Fort Collins earned national recognition and
moved up to a Class 4 ranking in the National
Flood Insurance Program’s Community
Rating System (CRS), the fifth highest rating
The L-Path Spill overtopped during the 2013 flood and
performed as designed. The embankment held in place and
the main flood flows stayed within the channel banks.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
in the country, and continued to pass on
30 percent discounts in flood insurance rates
to its citizens.96
To further improve Fort Collins' stormwater
infrastructure, several projects have been
completed since the 2013 flood including the
West Vine Outfall (2014), Lincoln/Willow
Storm Sewer Upgrades (2016), Boxelder
Stormwater Improvements on Prospect Road
(2016) and the Northeast College Corridor
Outfall, still in progress as of 2017. The largest
stream rehabilitation project to date, which
addressed steep eroding banks and improved
aquatic habitat, was at Fossil Creek in 2015.
On May 1, 2016 Fort Collins earned a
58
F ort Collins Utilities manages water,
the resource most critical to human
settlement and activity in this semi-arid,
northern Colorado community. Its story is
consistent with the overall history of resource
management in the United States, which can
be understood in three broad, chronological
stages. During the first phase, from the late
19th century to the 1930s, public entities
focused on extracting and storing natural
resources to meet economic and social needs.
Without much regard for environmental
consequences, they oversaw widespread
deforestation efforts and the construction
of massive dams to provide farmers with
reliable irrigation water. The second stage
spanned from the 1930s to the 1970s and
emphasized multiple uses that reflected
changing social values and modernization
efforts. When agencies designed new projects,
they considered many potential functions—
recreation, irrigation, flood control and
energy production, among others. The third
and current phase introduced an ecological
approach based on growing cultural and
scientific awareness of the human-nature
relationship. These stages provided the
context for the development and growth
of public entities all over the country,
including Utilities.97
In addition to water use policies and
procedures, cities need physical
infrastructure—a system of treatment
plants, delivery and collection pipes
and stormwater drains developed with
experience and ingenuity—to provide for
and protect their residents. Until the late
19th century, water infrastructure in
Fort Collins was characterized by quick
construction projects meant to thwart the
spread of disease. From the late 19th century
to World War II, scientific understanding
of issues such as the effects of bacteria on
public health influenced decisions. During
this phase, cities like Fort Collins focused
on the design of systems, policies and
regulations that would provide long-term
solutions for growing cities. After the war,
attention shifted from growth of infrastructure
to the maintenance and expansion of
existing systems.98
5
Service through
Sustainability:
Over 130 Years
of Water Service
in Fort Collins
View of Fort Collins with the Water
59
The development and growth of Utilities over
the decades fits into these larger national
patterns and includes periods of struggling
to keep up with the city’s needs as well as
examples of progressive, forward-thinking
solutions that placed the community ahead
of the norm. The three water utilities—water,
wastewater and stormwater—have evolved to
share the burden of responsibly in managing
water in order to provide predictable service.
This effort has required increasingly thorough
communication and cooperation as the water
system becomes more complex. Utilities’
customers, local irrigation companies,
nearby municipalities and water districts
have a stake in the process and opinions on
how the City manages water, which further
complicates Utilities’ decisions and operations.
As the expanding local economy and urban
boundary swallowed up agricultural land and
strained the infrastructure, tensions increased
surrounding use of the Poudre River—the
water source that made Fort Collins possible.
As a major user of the river, Utilities must
confront this community dialogue as it
continues to manage the local water supply in
the present and anticipate future needs.
Both the history and future of Fort Collins
are based in water. Water has been necessary
to foster growth, control development and
provide a particular quality of life for its users.
But water, as part of nature, also acts on its
own accord. Floods, droughts and its essential,
life-supporting function mean that water
managers and users always have to respond
to water as much as they seek to control it
and plan for the unknown. The green spaces,
healthy population and thriving recreational
opportunities convey a story of the City’s
successful relationship with water over time.
And water itself has played an active, essential
role in the city’s historical development.
Fort Collins is dependent on access to water
and the continuing activities of Utilities and
its employees. Since the 1880s, it has supplied
water for the people and the landscape of
the city in an increasingly complex supply,
treatment and flood management system that
maintains a healthy community and assures
downstream users of a healthy supply to enjoy
the same services. For over 130 years, Utilities
has continued to adapt to anticipate and adapt
to the city’s growing needs.
60
1. Lisa Voytko, phone interview by Christy Dickinson, Fort Collins,
November 6, 2012.
2. “High Park Fire Burned Area Emergency Response (BAER) Report,”
July 2012. http://larimer.org/highparkfire/bear_report.pdf, (accessed
November 28, 2012), 3-4.
3. Voytko, interview; Jeff Thomas, “Water Squeeze: Fort Collins Cuts Irrigation to
Farmers,” North Forty News, volume 20, number 10, December 2012.
4. James G. Lewis, The Forest Service and the Greatest Good: A Centennial History
(Durham: Forest History Society, 2005); Tori Rae Linenberger, Dams, Dynamos,
and Development: The Bureau of Reclamation’s Power Program and Electrification
of the West (Washington: Department of the Interior, 2002); William Rowley,
The Bureau of Reclamation: Origins and Growth to 1945, Volume I (Washington:
Government Printing Office, 2006).
5. Molly Nortier and Mike Smith, From Bucket to Basin: 100 Years of Water Service
(Fort Collins Water Utilities, 1982), 11.
6. Peter E. Black, et. al., Watershed Analysis of the North Fork of the Cache la Poudre
River (Fort Collins: Colorado State University, College of Forestry and Range
Management, 1959); United States Department of Agriculture, Cache la Poudre
Wild and Scenic River Final Management Plan (Fort Collins: USDA Forest
Service, 1990), http://digitool.library.colostate.edu///exlibris/dtl/d3_1/apache_
media/L2V4bGlicmlzL2R0bC9kM18xL2FwYWNoZV9tZWRpYS8zOTEzMA==.
pdf (accessed October 5, 2012), 7.
7. Ansel Watrous, History of Larimer Country Colorado, (Fort Collins: The Old
Army Press, 1972).
8. Carl McWilliams and Karen McWilliams, Agriculture in the Fort Collins Growth
Area: 1862-1994, (Fort Collins: Carl McWilliams and Karen McWilliams, 1995),
fcgov.com/historicpreservation/pdf/agriculture-uga-doc.pdf (accessed July 6,
2012), 15, 57.
9. McWilliams and McWilliams, Agriculture in the Fort Collins Growth Area, 57-8.
10. Franklin C. Avery, Local Biographies in Fort Collins History Connection,
http://history.poudrelibraries.org/cdm4/item_viewer.php?CISOROOT=/
pl&CISOPTR=1718&CISOBOX=1&REC=12, (accessed August 2, 2012);
Watrous, History of Larimer County Colorado, 62..
11. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin, 4.
12. Wayne C. Sundberg, Fort Collins’ First Water Works: Again a Work in Progress
(Fort Collins: Poudre Landmarks Foundation, Inc., 2004).
13. Sundberg, Fort Collins’ First Water Works, 27; Nortier and Smith, From Bucket
to Basin, 5; “Our Water Works: General Review of the Works,” Fort Collins
Courier, June 14, 1883, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection, http://tinyurl.
com/8ppskvc (accessed July 18, 2012).
14. “Talk on Water-Works and Monthly Fines,” Fort Collins Courier, February 2, 1882,
Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection, http://tinyurl.com/939ax8e (accessed
July 18, 2012).
15. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin; Sundberg, Fort Collins’ First Water
Works, 29.
16. Wayne C. Sundberg, Fort Collins’ First Water Works, 59, 61; City of Fort Collins,
Revised Ordinances of the City of Fort Collins (Fort Collins, 1905), 182.
17. John R. Stilgoe, Metropolitan Corridor: Railroads and the American Scene (New
Haven: Yale University Press, 1983), 111.
18. 1882-1883 Fort Collins Water Works brochure (Fort Collins: SDion, 2009);
Sundberg, Fort Collins’ First Water Works, 66, 73.
19. Ward Fischer, “History of Fort Collins Water” (lecture, Fort Collins
Historical Society, Fort Collins, 1988) in Fort Collins Historic Connection,
http://history.poudrelibraries.org/cgi-bin/showfile.exe?CISOROOT=/
oh&CISOPTR=617&filename=618.pdf#search=%22ward%20fischer%20
water%22, (accessed June 15, 2012); Nortier and Smith, 15; G.H. Palmes and S.R.
Case. Water: Past, Present, and Future (Fort Collins, 1963), 5.
20. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin, 10.
21. City of Fort Collins, Revised Ordinances of the City of Fort Collins, 6.
61
25. William C. Mitchell, “The Typhoid Epidemic Traced to Its Origin,” Fort Collins
Weekly Courier, December 13, 1900, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection,
http://tinyurl.com/8nau5ub (accessed June 6, 2012).
26. Mitchell, “The Typhoid Epidemic Traced to Its Origin.”
27. Mitchell, “The Typhoid Epidemic Traced to Its Origin”; “Water Works Extension,”
Fort Collins Weekly Courier, January 24, 1901, Colorado Historic Newspapers
Collection, http://tinyurl.com/9zdyg7l (accessed July 18, 2012).
28. Material for Hiram Prince was provided by Thelma Bishopp, PhD. Prince is the
ancestor of Water Utilities employee Errin Henggeler; Jean Miller, “Water From
the Mountains: The Grand Ditch,” Grand County History, grandcountyhistory.
com/article/water-mountains-grand-ditch, (accessed October 6, 2012).
29. “Election to Vote on Water Works Ordered,” Fort Collins Weekly Courier, March
4, 1903, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection, http://tinyurl.com/8fagwqa
(accessed September 29, 2012); “Water Bonds Already Voted: City Council
Authorized by Special Election to Issue Bonds for Water Works,” Fort Collins
Weekly Courier, March 25, 1903, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection,
http://tinyurl.com/8aolfep (accessed September 29, 2012).
30. “Settling Basin is Needed At Once,” Fort Collins Weekly Courier, August 26, 1908,
(provided by Michele Hays-Johnson, Plant Operator in the Water Production
Division, June 28, 2012).
31. “New Danger That Menaces Water Supply of City,” Fort Collins Express Courier,
March 27, 1909, (provided by Michele Hays-Johnson, June 28, 2012).
32. “City Clerk Seeks Information on Filter Question: So Far Has Learned Only
About the Roberts Mechanical Filter, Which Does Well in Some Cities, Cost of
the System Has Not Been Learned,” Fort Collins Express Courier, March 8, 1909,
(provided by Michele Hays-Johnson, June 28, 2012).
33. “New City Administration Starts on Harmony Basis,” Fort Collins Weekly Courier,
April 21, 1909, Historic Newspapers Collection, http://tinyurl.com/9rkug69,
(accessed September 29, 2012).
34. “City Council Decides on Roberts Mechanical Filter.” Fort Collins Express Courier,
July 20, 1909, (provided by Michele Hays-Johnson,, June 28, 2012); Palmes and
Case, Water: Past, Present, and Future, 9.
35. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin, 29.
36. “Combined Report of Commissioner of Works and City Engineer” (Fort Collins:
Colorado Printing Company, 1926), 13-16, (provided by Michele Hays-Johnson,
June 28, 2012).
37. “Combined Report of Commissioner of Works and City Engineer,” 6-8.
38. “Combined Report of Commissioner of Works and City Engineer,” 17.
39. Fort Collins History Connection, Fort Collins Timeline, 1910, http://history.
poudrelibraries.org/archive/timeline/1910.php#GOVERNMENT/CITY
DEVELOPMENT (accessed January 24, 2012); Nortier and Smith, From Bucket
to Basin, 29; “100,000 Acre Feet Loss of Poudre Water,” Fort Collins Courier, June
16, 1923, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection, http://tinyurl.com/9z59nwl
(accessed September 29, 2012); ”Water Waste During Flood is Enormous,” Fort
Collins Courier, June 12, 1923, Colorado Historic Newspapers Collection, http://
tinyurl.com/92brtmh (accessed September 29, 2012); Palmes and Case, Water:
Past, Present, and Future. Fort Collins, 9.
40. “Combined Report of Commissioner of Works and City Engineer,” 38-9, 46.
41. George M. Bull, State Engineer, PWA, to Fort Collins Mayor H.H. Hartman, July
2, 1934; Pershing, Nye, Bosworth and Dick to A.J. Rosenow, Fort Collins City
Clerk, December 19, 1934, Public Records, City Clerk’s Office, Fort Collins.
42. Daniel Tyler, The Last Water Hole in the West: The Colorado-Big Thompson Project
and the Northern Colorado Water Conservancy District (Niwot: University of
Colorado Press, 1992), 61-2, 90-2.
43. Tyler, The Last Water Hole in the West, 346; James Pritchett, “Quantification Task:
A Description of Agriculture Production and Water Transfers in the Colorado
River Basin,” (Fort Collins: Colorado Water Institute at Colorado State University,
2011), 6.
44. Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste was Won, 35.
62
48. R.L. Parshall, “The Water Problem,” (presented to the Fort Collins Rotary Club,
August 29, 1956 (provided by Mark Fiege and Nathan Citino, June 26, 2012).
49. Christensen and Waddell, 48; “City of Battle Creek Michigan: Water Facts:
Wastewater Treatment,” bcwater.org/waterfacts/wastewatertreatment.asp
(accessed July 2, 2012); Monroe Environmental: Liquid Clarification and Air/
Gas Cleaning Systems, “Water and Wastewater Treatment: Circular Clarifiers,”
monroeenvironmental.com/water-and-wastewater-treatment/circular-clarifiers
(accessed July 2, 2012).
50. Rose Laflin, Irrigation, Settlement and Change on the Cache la Poudre River (Fort
Collins: Colorado Water Resources Research Institute, 2005), 80.
51. “Country’s Water Supply Adequate,” State Times Advocate, June 1, 1953,
geneaologybank.com, (accessed June 26, 2012).
52. Conrad C. Green, et al., v. The Chaffee Ditch Company, et al., 150 Colo. 91,
(1962), lexisnexis.com/hottopics/lnacademic/ (accessed August 10, 2012).
53. Ward H. Fischer, “Letter for the Fort Collins ‘Water Progress and Projections
Report to the Citizens,’” (Fort Collins: Fort Collins Water Utilities, 1980).
54. Herb and Esther Alexander, interviewed by Charlene Tresner, November 7, 1984,
Fort Collins History Connection, http://history.poudrelibraries.org/cdm4/item_
viewer.php?CISOROOT=/oh&CISOPTR=843&CISOBOX=1&REC=1 (accessed
May 29, 2012).
55. Martin Melosi, The Sanitary City: Environmental Services in Urban America
from the Colonial Times to the Present (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh
Press, 2008), 1; Informal conversation with Colorado State University history
professor Mark Fiege, August 16, 2012; “Combined Report of Commissioner of
Works and City Engineer,” 6-8; Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste was
Won, 48; Laflin Irrigation, Settlement and Change on the Cache la Poudre River;
Ward Fischer, interviewed by Karen Waddell, February 2, 1989, Fort Collins
History Connection, http://history.poudrelibraries.org/cdm4/item_viewer.
php?CISOROOT=/oh&CISOPTR=598&CISOBOX=1&REC=2, (accessed June
26, 2012).
56. Palmes and Case, Water: Past, Present, and Future, 22.
57. Harvey Johnson, interview by Don McMillen, September 6, 1974, Oral Histories
Collection, Fort Collins Archives.
58. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin, 22; Fischer, “Letter for the Fort Collins
‘Water Progress and Projections Report to the Citizens’”; Clyde Greenwood,
in-person interviewed by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort Collins,
June 25, 2012.
59. Raymond L. Anderson, Expansion of Water Delivery by Municipalities and Special
Water Districts in the Northern Front Range, Colorado, 1972-1982 (Fort Collins:
Colorado Water Resources Research Institute, 1984), 41.
60. Tom E. Bell, Joe Wright Reservoir-Michigan Ditch Municipal Water Storage Project
by the City of Fort Collins (Red Feather: USDA Forest Service, 1975), 33.
61. Fischer interview.
62. City of Fort Collins Water Utilities Annual Report for 1984; Owen Randall,
in-person interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort Collins, June
20, 2012; Kevin Gertig, in-person interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle
Frank, Fort Collins, June 28, 2012; City of Fort Collins Water Utilities Annual
Report for 1987; Pipelines Newsletter, October 1987; Lisa Voytko, in-person
interview by Christy Dickinson, Nichelle Frank and Lucas Moutett, and tour of
Water Treatment Facility, Fort Collins, May 31, 2012.
63. Cliff Hoelscher, in-person interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank,
and tour of Halligan Reservoir, Fort Collins, June 18, 2012 and June 22, 2012;
“Utilities: Water: Halligan Reservoir Enlargement,” fcgov.com/utilities/what-
we-do/water/halligan-reservoir-enlargement-project, (accessed June 15, 2012).
64. “City Comments on Latest NISP Environmental Report,” City of Fort Collins,
fcgov.com/nispreview (accessed January 23, 2012); “NISP Overview,” Northern
Colorado Water Conservancy District, northernwater.org/WaterProjects/NISP.
aspx (accessed January 23, 2012); “The Endangered Cache la Poudre River,”
Save the Poudre, savethepoudre.org/the-nisp-glade-project.html (accessed
63
70. “Bad City Water Brings Lawsuit Threats: Four Cases of Salmonellosis reported,”
Triangle Review, August 24, 1977, in “Scrapbook, 1977-79,” at the City of Fort
Collins Utilities Service Center.
71. Elmund interview.
72. Fort Collins Water Utilities: Projects and Projections, 1975-1979, 1980-1985 (Fort
Collins: Fort Collins Water Utilities Department, 1980), 13; Elmund interview.
73. City of Fort Collins, Water Utilities Annual Report for 1987, Fort Collins Utilities
Service Center; “EPA Honors Fort Collins Water Plant,” Rocky Mountain News,
September 23, 1987, Fort Collins Archives vertical file, FC Government, Water
and Wastewater, 2.
74. Pipelines Newsletter, March-April 1984, edited by Molly Nortier.
75. City of Fort Collins, Water Utilities Annual Report for 1990, Fort Collins Utilities
Service Center.
76. Ward Fischer, “Memorandum to the Water Board re: Meter Study,” April 3,
1980, FC-Govt-Water-Public Works vertical file, Fort Collins Local History
Archive; Dennis A Bode, P.E. and Steve L. Olson, Summary Informational
Report on Conservation and Metering in Fort Collins (City of Fort Collins Water
Utilities Department, October 1980), 1-2; “City Pushing Education of Water
Conservation” Fort Collins Coloradoan, July 7, 1977, article in “Scrapbook, 1977-
79,” at the City of Fort Collins Utilities Service Center.
77. Molly Nortier, email message to Christy Dickinson, May 1, 2013.
78. Raymond L. Anderson, “We Don’t Lack Water; Meters Not Needed,” Fort Collins
Coloradoan, January 12, 1985, FC Govt-Water and Wastewater 2 vertical file, Fort
Collins Local History Archive.
79. MaryLou Smith, in-person interview by Christy Dickinson, Fort Collins, June 21,
2012; Raymond L. Anderson, “We Don’t Lack Water; Meters Not Needed.”
80. Teresa Ford, “City Suggests Phased-In Plan for Water Meters,” Fort Collins
Coloradoan, November 14, 1985; Sonja Bisbee, Fort Collins Coloradoan;
Feb 27, 1999.
81. City of Fort Collins, “Water Conservation Annual Reports,” 2011 and 2012.
82. Smith interview; Dennis Bode, Donnie Dustin and Laurie D’Audney, “Water
Supply and Demand Management Policy Report,” Fort Collins Utilities, May
2004, fcgov.com/utilities/img/site_specific/uploads/wsdmp-report04.pdf,
(accessed January 8, 2013), 1-1, 1-4, 3-7-8. In 1978, a Fort Collins ordinance
required low-flow plumbing fixtures including 3.5 gallons per minute toilets, 3
gallons per minute showerheads and 2 gallons per minute faucets.
83. Bode, et. al, “Water Supply and Demand Management Policy Report,” p. 7-4-5.
84. Lynn Adams and Patty Bigner, “A Utility for the 21st Century—Creating a Path
Toward Sustainability,” in AWWA Journal, AWWA May 2010, fcgov.com/utilities/
img/site_specific/uploads/awwa-journal-may-2010.pdf (accessed March 15,
2013), 47; Smith interview; Bode, et. al, “Water Supply and Demand Management
Policy Report,” 1-1, 1-4, 3-7-8.
85. Nortier and Smith, From Bucket to Basin, 31; Rodney Albers, in-person
interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort Collins, June 11, 2012;
“Utilities: Stormwater: History,” fcgov.com/utilities/what-we-do/stormwater/
history, (accessed October 25, 2013); Owen Randall, in-person interview by
Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort Collins, June 20, 2012; City of Fort
Collins Utilities, Stormwater Master Plan: Executive Summary Report, September
2003; Ken Sampley and Marsha Hilmes-Robinson, in-person interview by
Maren Bzdek, Fort Collins, November 6, 2013; Center for Urban Policy and the
Environment at Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI)
and the Watershed Management Institute, Inc., An Internet Guide to Financing
Stormwater Management, “Stormwater Management Financing Case Study, Fort
Collins, Colorado,” http://stormwaterfinance.urbancenter.iupui.edu/PDFs/Fort
Collins.pdf (accessed November 7, 2013).
86. “Utilities: Stormwater: History;” Albers interview; Randall interview;
Sampley and Hilmes-Robinson interview; Stormwater Master Plan: Executive
Summary Report.
87. City of Fort Collins, Water Utilities Annual Report for 1993, Fort Collins Utilities
64
90. City of Fort Collins, “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment,”
unpublished document; City of Fort Collins, PowerPoint presentation, “2013
Fort Collins Flood: An Early Retrospective,” November 5, 2013.
91. City of Fort Collins, “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment,”;
“2013 Fort Collins Flood: An Early Retrospective,”; Ken Sampley and Marsha
Hilmes-Robinson interview.
92. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective;” Sampley and Hilmes-Robinson interview.
93. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective;” Sampley and Hilmes-Robinson interview.
94. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective;” Sampley and Hilmes-Robinson interview.
95. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective.”
96. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective.”
97. “2013 Fort Collins Flood: A Preliminary Assessment;” “2013 Fort Collins Flood:
An Early Retrospective.”
98. George Perkins Marsh, Man and Nature: Or, Physical Geography as Modified by
Human Action (New York: Charles Scribner, 1864); .James G. Lewis, The Forest
Service and the Greatest Good: A Centennial History (Durham: Forest History
Society, 2005); Tori Rae Linenberger, Dams, Dynamos, and Development:
The Bureau of Reclamation’s Power Program and Electrification of the West
(Washington: Department of the Interior, 2002); William Rowley, The Bureau
of Reclamation: Origins and Growth to 1945, Volume I (Washington D.C.:
Government Printing Office, 2006).
Service Center; City of Fort Collins, Water Utilities Annual Report for 1995, Fort
Collins Utilities Service Center; “Utilities: Stormwater: Stormwater Quality,” City
of Fort Collins, fcgov.com/utilities/what-we-do/stormwater/stormwater-quality
(accessed Dec. 5, 2012). “Utilities: Stormwater: History”; Sampley and Hilmes-
Robinson interview.
88. The Fort Collins citizens who died in the 1997 flood were JoAnn Roth, Rose
Marie Rodriquez, Sarah Payne, Estefana Guarneros and Cindy Schultz. “Utilities:
Stormwater: Flooding,” fcgov.com/utilities/what-we-do/stormwater/flooding
(accessed July 17, 2012); “Flooding History: Spring Creek Basin,” provided by
Matt Fater via e-mail message from Laurie D’Audney, March 9, 2013; Sampley
and Hilmes-Robinson interview; Neil S. Grigg et al, “Fort Collins Flood 1997:
Comprehensive View of an Extreme Event,” Journal of Water Resources Planning
and Management, September/October 1999, 255-262.
89. Utilities: Stormwater: History; Sampley and Hilmes-Robinson interview,
November 6, 2013; Stormwater Master Plan: Executive Summary Report,
September 2003.
January 23, 2012).
65. “Water Quality Act of 1965: Hearing Before a Special Subcommittee on Air and
Water Pollution of the Committee on Public Works, United States Congress,”
(Washington: US Government Printing Office, 1965), http://tinyurl.com/8apj36e
(accessed October 19, 2012), 15.
66. “Water Quality Act of 1965: Hearing Before a Special Subcommittee on Air and
Water Pollution of the Committee on Public Works, United States Congress,” 15.
67. Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste Was Won, 55; Keith Elmund, in-person
interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort Collins, June 12, 2012.
68. Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste Was Won, 59; Elmund interview;
Chuck Gross, in-person interview by Christy Dickinson and Nichelle Frank, Fort
Collins, June 18, 2012.
69. Edwin Hilgenberg interview by Robert M. Copeland, June 18, 1980, Poudre River
Public Library, Old Town location; Elmund interview; Gross interview.
45. Stanley R. Case, The Poudre: A Photo History (Bellvue: Stanley R. Case, 1995),
2; Robin Pierce, email message to Christy Dickinson, January 28, 2013. Records
are unclear as to what years the Director of Light and Power stopped overseeing
Water and Wastewater. The two utility departments went through several years of
running jointly, then separately, then jointly. Records show Stan Case succeeded
Guy Palmes as manager of Light and Power and Charles Liquin succeeded Palmes
as Manager of Water and Wastewater. However, if the manager of Light and
Power remained the overall administrator for City utilities in 1939, Stan Case
would have also been the Director of Utilities (including Water and Wastewater).
There are no dates to indicate when Charles Liquin became manager of Water and
Wastewater.
46. Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste was Won, 39.
47. Christensen and Waddell, How the Waste was Won, 48.
22. City of Fort Collins, Revised Ordinances of the City of Fort Collins, 117-18
23. Martin Melosi, The Sanitary City: Environmental Services in America from
Colonial Times to the Present (Pittsburgh: University of Pittsburgh Press, 2008),
5; Joel Tarr, The Search for the Ultimate Sink: Urban Pollution in Historical
Perspective (Akron: University of Akron Press, 1996), xliii; Erin Christensen and
Karen Waddell, How the Waste was Won: A Century of Wastewater Service in
Fort Collins, 1888-1988 (Fort Collins: City of Fort Collins Water and Wastewater
Utility, 1988).
24. Mary J. Carpenter, “Sanitary Conditions Necessary to Health,” Fort Collins
Courier, May 21, 1891, Colorado Historic Newspapers, http://tinyurl.
com/982uuhl (accessed June 13, 2012).
Notes
Treatment Facility in the foreground.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Class 2 rating in the National Flood Insurance
Program's CRS. This makes Fort Collins
one of five communities nationwide with the
same rating or higher and provides up to a
40 percent discount in flood insurance rates
for citizens and businesses.
Lincoln Avenue to protect the Buckingham
and Andersonville neighborhoods from
100-year floods that might enter from the
east. This FEMA-certified levee performed
as expected during the 2013 flood, as did the
Timberline Road Levee, constructed in 1999
to prevent the Poudre River from overtopping
and flooding the road and properties near the
intersection of Prospect and Timberline roads.
Near Riverbend Ponds, where the Poudre
River flows just east of Timberline, the L-Path
Spill Project was developed to create a side-
spill channel for flood events that would not
damage the natural area.92 Additionally, the
Canal Importation Ponds and Outfall Project
was completed in 2012.
Fort Collins also made significant progress
in limiting and reducing development in the
city’s floodplains. From 1998 to 2007, the City
removed approximately 2,480 structures from
the floodplain. By 2013, through the creation
of natural areas and parks, the City had
preserved as open space 66 percent of the total
1,485 acres of land in the Poudre’s 100-year
floodplain. Adding to the open space solution
for floodplain mitigation, the “Willing Seller,
Willing Buyer Program” launched in 2000.
With this program, residential and business
owners in or around the floodplain can sell
their properties to the City for removal. Before
2013, only four structures had been purchased,
but the flood renewed recognition for the
program as a key component for effective
floodplain management.93
The new standards for development in the
floodplain meant that Fort Collins’ residential
and commercial development in the new
century proceeded with some assurance that
damage and risk from future flood events
would be minimized within the city and for its
downstream neighbors. The new construction
requirement of a 2-foot freeboard above the
100-year flood water surface elevation in the
Poudre River basin assured minimal structural
damage to those buildings. In addition, Fort
Collins had established a floodplain regulation
Sign near the Spring Creek/College Avenue
intersection indicating water levels that occurred
in that area during the 1997 flood.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
that go beyond minimum federal requirements
and rewards communities with flood insurance
discounts. On the evening of July 28, 1997,
disaster struck. A storm system drifted over
the Front Range and released tiny, needle-like
raindrops in dense waves primarily in western
Fort Collins. The uneven weather with its
peculiar precipitation produced heavy flooding
on the west side and significantly less rainfall
on the east side, causing initial confusion
followed by great alarm throughout the city
as news of the flood spread.
The storm dropped 14.5 inches of rain
in 31 hours, overflowing the stormwater
infrastructure, natural channels and ditches. The
excess water inundated adjacent neighborhoods
and CSU. Five people died as a result of the
flood, 54 people were injured, 200 homes were
destroyed, and the city suffered more than $200
million in damage. The devastating flood along
Spring Creek became a turning point for flood
mitigation and floodplain regulations in the
city. But the flood also reinforced the benefits
of measures the City had begun to put into
place for new developments. On Fossil Creek,
the rainfall was less intense but still qualified
as a 50-year flood event. Because development
in that basin followed a 1982 Master Plan
that allowed development only outside of the
floodplain, no structures were damaged.88
Although it recognized that complete
protection from floods of that magnitude
was an unrealistic goal, City Council and
Stormwater Utility employees agreed that
much more could be done to protect Fort
Collins from 100-year floods. The 1997 flood
tested the major features of the system and
exposed weak components and the need to
plan for extraordinary events. As a result, an
automated flood early warning system based
on rainfall and stream gauge data became a
priority and was installed in 1999. Also in that
year, the City began three major stormwater
outfall projects in the downtown area on
Howes, Locust and Oak streets.
A Precipitation Study Task Force provided
guidance for a new study of historical rainfall
records, which led to the development of
new rainfall criteria for mapping floodplains
and designing adequate stormwater
infrastructure. The new rainfall standard,
raised from 2.89 inches over a two-hour
period to 3.67 inches, identified more homes
and infrastructure that would be damaged
in a 100-year flood. The decade ended with a
much stronger sense of urgency for mitigating
citywide drainage problems.89
In the first decade of the 21st century, the City
continued to improve upon environmental
standards and goals and build on the
momentum that the 1997 Flood provided for
floodplain management in Fort Collins. The
stringency of the regulatory environment
was evolving and the City continued to
improve upon its planning documents as
well as execute the requirements. In 2004,
City Council adopted a new Stormwater
Master Plan to address flooding and water
quality concerns in the community, and in
2005–2006, Fort Collins updated its floodplain
regulations. In 2008, the City entered into
an intergovernmental agreement with the
Town of Wellington and Larimer County for
stormwater cooperation in the Boxelder Basin.
The next year, Utilities reviewed its stormwater
program to further reflect the City's increasing
emphasis on environmental protection and
1−2
2+
LEGEND
High Risk Floodplain
Moderate Risk Floodplain
0–1
1–2
2+
N
Map showing depth of flood water overtopping roads during
a 100-year storm for northern Fort Collins, based on the 2003
Stormwater Master Plan Executive Summary.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
The WEP uses three implementation
principles: 1) employ sophisticated data-driven
processes and decision-making, 2) cultivate
new and bolster existing community and
statewide partnerships, and 3) coordinate
and support symbiotic efforts within Utilities
and across the City.
Because Utilities does not provide water
service to all customers within the city limits,
nor the growth management area (GMA),
there are a number of water districts such as
East Larimer County Water District (ELCO)
and Fort Collins-Loveland Water District
(FCLWD) that provide service to a portion of
Fort Collins’ residents and businesses. Utilities
provides some water conservation programs
to residents in the water districts and, as noted
above, the Water Conservation team hopes
to expand these offerings and partnership in
the future.
On March 7, 2017, City Council adopted
Resolution 2017-029 approving the Charter
of the Regional Collaboration Steering
Committee. The Steering Committee is
composed of members of governing boards
and staff of Fort Collins Utilities, ELCO, and
FCLWD. The proposed Steering Committee
Charter articulates key regional water issues
identified by the Steering Committee and
the purpose and intended outcomes of
regional water collaboration. One of the three
identified key issues is “Coordination of water
conservation and shortage response plans in
the GMA. Such coordination will be focused
on providing consistent water conservation
programs, improving water efficiency, and
aligning water shortage responses for each
water provider across the GMA.”
Floodplain Regulations and
Stormwater Management
Until the 1960s, urban development in Fort
Collins included inadequate drainage facilities
that were not designed to accommodate major
flood events and stormwater runoff. Pavement
and structures covered the area’s natural
drainage ways and open space, making these
neighborhoods vulnerable to flooding. New
developments in the 1960s began to include
drainage facilities that could accommodate
runoff from larger storms, but the densely
developed older sections in the urban
floodplains remained vulnerable.
In the 1970s, Utilities further evolved its
ability to predict and prepare for flooding
in vulnerable areas. The City developed its
first maps of the Poudre River floodplain
in 1975. In the following year, a major flash
flood event on the Big Thompson River
south of Fort Collins killed 139 people and
raised the awareness of potential flood risk
among the residents and business owners
in northern Colorado.
A progressive City Council began to focus on
long-term, citywide flood control planning
and regulatory needs. The 1976 Storm
Drainage Ordinance established a Storm
Drainage Board to create design criteria,
divide the city into 11 identified drainage
basins and create a separate master plan for
each basin. The ordinance also established
that the property owners, who would benefit
most from the establishment of adequate
drainage in each basin should bear the costs
of construction. But drainage improvements
were only possible with tax-based financing
and stormwater projects often did not compete
well against more visible projects.
Collins became a partner in the EPA’s
voluntary WaterSense program in 2007.82
Water conservation reduced expenses
related to raw water treatment, treatment
plant capacity and infrastructure wear and
tear. It also gave the City the option to lease
excess water to outside users. But the City
experienced a loss of revenue as water users
began to conserve, which led to an increase
in water rates to meet budgetary demands.
In 2003, Fort Collins implemented a usage-
based, tiered water rate structure to promote
water conservation. Single-family and duplex
water users were charged an incrementally
higher rate for higher water use.83
2012 brought some of the highest temperatures
in recorded history, with a mean daily
temperature of 53.5 degrees Fahrenheit.
At the same time, total annual precipitation
was well below average at 10.8 inches. Total
water demand was about 106 percent of
projected demand, and the City’s peak day
use of 46.8 million gallons occurred weeks
earlier than usual, on June 22.
Daily per capita use increased from 141 gallons
in 2011 to 166 gallons in 2012. But when this
A 2007 Stormwater project at Dry Creek, a tributary to the
Poudre River that extends from the Wyoming boarder. This
basin is part of a flood control project that will help stop
flooding along the creek.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Policy in 1988. In 1990, the state Legislature
passed the Colorado Water Metering Act—
the long-anticipated state requirement that
effectively forced Fort Collins to require
metering. Fort Collins expanded the water
conservation officer position to full-time, and
in 1992, the Fort Collins City Council adopted
its Water Demand Management Policy that
established a dozen water conservation
measures and two water use goals. In 1997,
250
232
1985–1992 Use
1993–2001 Use
2003 WSDMP Goal
2004–2016 Use
WSDMP Planning Demand Level
2010 WCP Goal
196
185
149 150
140
2015 WEP Goal
130
200
150
100
50
0
Gallons per Capita per Day (GPCD)
City of Fort Collins – GPCD Comparisons
This graph shows declining
consumption in the era of water
conservation practices.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Ed Hilgenberg’s 1973 report estimated the
total cost for meter installation at $1,746,800.
In his 1975 master’s thesis, Daniel Lau
concluded that investment in Joe Wright
Reservoir proved more cost effective as a
means of meeting current and future needs
than universal metering. Fort Collins chose to
postpone metering, partly due to the enormity
of labor and funds required to install meters
while the City invested in the renovation of Joe
Wright Reservoir.76
Fort Collins was slow to adopt universal
metering even though many understood it
could serve as a fundamental tool for solving
water supply problems via water conservation.
Like many cities, Fort Collins often had
created new policies and reforms in response
to crises. In the early 1880s, two structural
fires prompted the formation of a public water
works. The spread of disease in the early 20th
century stimulated decisions about moving
the Poudre diversion point. Rapid population
growth in the 1950s encouraged an effort to
purchase senior water rights. Agricultural
and urban tensions in the 1960s resulted
in the creation of a Water Board. Drought in
the late 1960s encouraged consideration of
water conservation methods. But in the case
of metering, conflicting opinion on City
Council and the Water Board about the best
use of funding led to a delay in metering for
Fort Collins.
This Fort Collins Water Utilities marketing brochure for
meter installation featuring Mayor Ann Azari was a humorous
approach to spreading the word about mandatory metering.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Advanced meters for electricity and radio modules for water
meters were deployed between March 2012 and June 2013.
Water meters have a separate radio module that transmits
meter readings every four hours.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Plant No. 2 (now Water Treatment Facility).
In 1987, because it successfully managed
complexities of water management in a
growing community, DWRF received
the Environmental Protection Agency’s
(EPA) highest regional award. The 1987
Operations and Maintenance Excellence
Award recognized the best operated facility
in the six-state region, including Colorado,
Montana, Wyoming, Utah, North Dakota
and South Dakota. In 1993, the EPA again
honored the work of the wastewater utility
with both a regional and national award for
work at DWRF that recognized the impact of
discharged water in the local ecosystem—an
honorable and highly valued achievement.73
Fort Collins also stayed abreast with
another important national trend in waste
disposal methodology. In 1984, the City
established the Resource Recovery Farm at
the southwest corner of Prospect Road and
I-25 to experiment with the beneficial reuse
Drake Water Reclamation Facility
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Mulberry Water Reclamation Facility
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Meadow Springs Ranch
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
Lab technicians Janie Dodd (left) and
Keith Elmund (right) evaluate water samples
from the Fort Collins area, circa 1970.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
its return to the Poudre River. Also, storm
drains carried rain and snow from the urban
landscape to the Poudre River. The Water
Quality Act of 1965 required Fort Collins
Water Utilities to consider downstream water
users, including municipalities, rural districts,
natural habitats and industries. As a result,
water management in Fort Collins grew
in complexity.
In the mid-1960s, federal regulation required
professional expertise that the water and
wastewater utilities did not have on staff.
Consequently, the City contracted services to
keep up with the increasing regulations. When
it came time for routine water sampling, for
instance, samples were sent to the State Health
Department in Denver because it did not have
a certified in-house laboratory.67
Fort Collins Water Utilities also met the
demands of its expanding customer base
by increasing the number of professionals
in their administrative organization. Both
water and wastewater utilities augmented
their procedures, and supervisory roles
began to change. During the 1960s and
1970s, supervisors such as Herb Alexander,
Ed Hilgenberg and Cotton Morgan who had
all worked for the City since World War II,
had developed flexible, spontaneous, yet
thorough and deeply committed approaches
to water services. Their intimate knowledge of
their jobs and strong work ethics influenced
incoming employees. Increased federal
regulation changed this personal approach,
A May 1979 public awareness campaign expressed
the importance of water conservation.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
through solid rock at 10,000+ feet elevation,
is 8 feet in diameter and 760 feet long.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
34
14
14
14
287
287
Larimer County
Weld County
Larimer County
Boulder County
Larimer County
Jackson County
Jackson County
Grand County
Carter Lake
Reservoir
(USBR & NW)
Lake
Agnes
Munroe Tunnel
(NPIC)
Michigan
Ditch
(CFC)
Comanche
Reservoir
(City of Greeley)
Fossil Creek
Reservoir
(NPIC)
Hourglass
Reservoir
(City of Greeley)
CFC Raw
Water Lines
Shadow
Mountain
Lake
Pleasant
Valley
Pipeline
(Partial CFC)
Meadow Creek
Reservoir
(Partial CFC)
Power
Plant
Power
Plant
Alva B. Adams Tunnel
Power
Plant
Hansen
Feeder
Canal
34
Fort Collins
Water District
Hansen
Feeder
Canal
CFC River
Diversion
Rigden Reservoir
(CFC)
(Operational 2015)
Cach
e
La
P
o
u
d
r
e
River
L
a
r
a
m
i
e R
i
v
e
r
M
i
c
h
i
gan
R
i
v
e
r
B
i
g
T
h
o
m
pson
R
i
v
e
r
C
o
l
orad
o
R
i
v
e
r
N
o
r
t
h
F
o
r
k
Cache La
P
ou
d
r
e
R
iv
e
r
J
o
e
Wr
i
g
h
t
C
r
e
e
k
S
o
u
t
h
F
o
r
k
C
a
c
he La
P
o
u
dr
e
R
i
ver
FORT COLLINS
LOVELAND
WINDSOR
GREELEY
MEAD
ESTES PARK
MILLIKEN
TIMNATH
JOHNSTOWN
BERTHOUD
SEVERANCE
WELLINGTON
LYONS
GRAND LAKE
Lone Pine Cr
Beaver Creek
Sheep Creek #1
Sheep Creek
Willow Creek #2
Nunn Creek
Sand Creek
Willow Creek
Roaring Creek
Roaring (fk) Creek
Willow Creek #3
Sheep Creek #2
Willow Creek
Willow Creek
Sand Creek
Sheep Creek
Beaver Creek
Sand Creek
Willow Creek
Beaver Creek
Sheep Creek
Willow Creek
City of Fort Collins
Water Supply System
0 4,000000 8,000 16,000 24,000 32,
Feet
Legend
City Limits
City Growth Management Area
Counties
Water Bodies
Major Watershed Streams
Minor Watershed Streams
City Raw Water Pipes
Continental Divide
Area State Highways
Interstate 25
Water Districts
ELCO Water District
Fort Collins Loveland Water District
Fort Collins Utilities (Water)
Sunset Water District
West Fort Collins Water District
Colorado Big Thompson Facilities
Tunnel
Pipes
Canals
Key
CFC - City of Fort Collins
NPIC - North Poudre Irrigation Company
NW - Northern Water
USBR - U.S. Bureau of Reclamation
WSSC - Water Supply and Storage Company
quality for Utilities customers. The basin was
constructed using almost 1 million pounds of
reinforcing steel and over 4,500-cubic yards
of concrete.
In addition to improvements in water
treatment, the City continued to emphasize
an adequate and secure supply of water for
its growing populace. Halligan Reservoir,
northwest of Fort Collins, was built in 1910
by NPIC to store water for its shareholders. In
1993, Fort Collins Water Utilities acquired the
rights to the reservoir and surrounding land,
but not the water in the reservoir. To provide
a reserve for drought years, Fort Collins Water
Utilities aimed to enlarge the dam to store
spring runoff water that the City owned but
could not hold.63 The City’s 2003 Water Supply
and Demand Management Policy also pointed
to the need for additional long-term water
storage to capture surplus in wet years for use
in periods of drought and high demand. As a
key component of that strategy, the proposal
to enlarge Halligan Reservoir required
compliance with federal environmental law to
determine its potential impact and suitability
as the best alternative for meeting the required
storage needs. That process began officially
in 2006 when the City of Fort Collins and
the City of Greeley sought permits with the
intent to enlarge both Halligan Reservoir
and Greeley’s Seaman Reservoir. In 2015,
the permitting process for Halligan and the
Seaman reservoirs was separated. The draft
Environmental Impact Statement (EIS)
required by the National Environmental Policy
Act (NEPA) for Halligan Reservoir is expected
to be completed in 2017 and will determine
the environmental effects of the reservoir
enlargement project on the North Fork of the
Poudre River.
Additionally, reservoirs not owned or used by
the City still influence its current operations.
In 2004, the NCWCD, now known as Northern
Water (NW), proposed a water storage
and distribution plan called the Northern
Integrated Supply Project (NISP). A keystone
of the proposed project requires damming
the Poudre River to form Glade Reservoir
northwest of Fort Collins. With a capacity of
170,000 acre-feet, Glade Reservoir would be
20 percent bigger than neighboring Horsetooth
Reservoir. Its purpose would be to store water
that otherwise runs to downriver states for
15 participating northern Colorado water
Built in 1978, Hewlett-Packard in Fort Collins initially
included three buildings.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H08121
Aerial view of Joe Wright Reservoir.
Courtesy of Dick Stenzel at the Applegate Group
during the population boom of the 1960s.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, CO1248
Michigan Ditch (horizontal line through the trees) carries
water from the Michigan River over Cameron Pass to Joe
Wright Reservoir where water then flows into the Poudre
River. The ditch redirects the water flow to Fort Collins from
its natural route toward Wyoming.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
the point of diversion 13 miles upstream to
the Poudre Canyon Plant in order to satisfy
the beneficial use requirement. The proposed
change in diversion would affect many
downriver water rights holders, particularly
local farmers. This plan led Fort Collins and
local farmers to the Colorado Supreme Court.
Because junior water users would be adversely
affected by the change in diversion, the
Supreme Court questioned the plan. While
water rights usage can legally change from
agricultural to municipal, junior water users
have the right to protect their property. Senior
water right holders return excess water to the
river as return flows, which junior water right
holders can access. A change in diversion
affects junior water rights if the amount of
water historically returned to the river is
decreased. In Conrad C. Green, et al., v. The
Chaffee Ditch Company, et al., the court ruled
that the location of the original diversion
could not be detached from the right itself, as
it would upset historic flows. Also, more junior
appropriators had expectations for their flow
to remain as it did at the time of appropriation
and the rights that they held had to be
considered. The farmers won the case because
the City’s needs were not a sufficient claim to
take away water from junior appropriations.52
The controversy led to a general understanding
that the City of Fort Collins needed a stronger
planning process to ensure an adequate water
supply. It also needed to repair relations with
the local agricultural community and other
downstream users. City Council member
Harvey Johnson was elected mayor while also
serving as president of the Water Supply and
Storage Company. With expertise in resolving
supply and delivery problems and connections
in the water community, Johnson was the right
person at the right time to address the City’s
strategic planning needs. Johnson immediately
created a Water Board to provide guidance
The history of Fort Collins Water Utilities would be incomplete without special mention of
the Alexander family. Herb and Esther Alexander, and later their son, Ben Alexander, made a
substantial impact on Utilities’ services. Herb started working for Utilities in 1942 and retired
from his position as Poudre Canyon Plant Superintendent in 1979. Herb and Esther lived at
the Poudre Canyon Plant site and took their responsibility very seriously. In a 1984 oral history
conducted by local historian Charlene Tresner, Esther Alexander commented, “The telephone
was in the house—if they needed anything, I was the one that was called. And of course, you
live right there, you live with it. Your kids are learning it. You learn everything about the water
works.” She added, “And it’s like herding sheep. You’ve got to be with the water all the time.”54
Many Utilities employees acknowledge the contributions of both Herb and Ben Alexander.
Herb played a large role in the planning and eventual acquisition of the Michigan Ditch system,
and Ben implemented many of the first-class water treatment practices that are admired by
industry experts throughout the world.
houses, sludge drying beds, piping and
connections to the sewer system.” It was
anticipated to treat an average of 3 million
gallons per day.47 This system pulverized solids
in the comminutor, then measured them with
a Parshall flume and deposited them in settling
chambers where sludge settled to the bottom
and oils rose to the surface to be skimmed off
by a primary clarifier. The effluent, or liquid
wastewater with the solids removed, passed to
The natural basin west of Fort Collins that
would become Horsetooth Reservoir, circa 1951.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, S00323
The foundation laid during these decades
would be challenged and expanded as Fort
Collins experienced exponential population
growth in the following years.
it or transfer the water to another ditch. In
1934, after much debate and petitioning from
residents, the City moved forward with the
project using municipal bonds and federal
New Deal funding through the Federal
Emergency Administration of Public
Works (later renamed the Public Works
Administration) to fund the costs of covering
sections of the ditch.41 An uncovered segment
of the main ditch still runs across the Colorado
State University campus west of the Lory
Student Center.
In the 1930s, water-related concerns in Fort
Collins shifted from flooding to drought.
The Great Depression and severe drought of
that decade caused Coloradans to consider
the reliability of their water supply. During
that devastating period, westerners lacked a
dependable water supply for irrigation, and
topsoil from the hardest hit states on the Great
Plains blew away in dust clouds. The federal
government responded with multipurpose
projects designed on an unprecedented scale.
The C-BT project was conceptualized by the
Bureau of Reclamation in 1937. It addressed
various water needs in the growing Front
Range region, which required increased
irrigation and domestic supplies. The project
The original six sand filters constructed at
the Poudre Canyon Plant in 1913.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H21882
opportunities. In the 20th century, federal
agencies such as the United States Forest
Service and municipal entities such as Fort
Collins Water Utilities were called upon
to meet more diverse and complex needs,
including resource protection. Therefore, they
were required to cooperate to address the
needs of an entire region.
Watershed protection was a primary area
of mutual interest. City officials observed
that more traffic in the adjacent foothills
compromised the Poudre River’s quality. In
May 1923, the City of Fort Collins and the
City of Greeley asked the U. S. Forest Service
to create a partnership to protect the Poudre
River’s Little South Fork watershed. The area
had potential to become a lucrative tourist
attraction with its dense forests and clear
streams beckoning campers with its distinct
Colorado scene. Fort Collins and Greeley
wanted to help regulate activity in the area
and appealed to the Forest Service that the
cities would enforce the Forest Service’s health
regulations and eliminate the possibility
of invading homesteaders with the cities’
constant presence in the area.
The resulting contract between the United
States Department of Agriculture (which
encompasses the U.S. Forest Service), Fort
Collins and Greeley stated that the cities’
activities in the area assisted water supply
protection. The two cities further established
their presence near the Little South Fork
watershed when they jointly purchased the
L.O. Rockwell ranch, about 40 miles northwest
of Fort Collins, for $14,250 in an effort to
prevent development of summer cottages on
the land. The cities then leased campgrounds
where they could enforce health regulations
and used the income to pay interest on
their loans. Fort Collins and Greeley also
purchased the Dixon homestead near Fort
Collins to secure the health of the river closer
to home. In the 1920s, the two cities, along
with Larimer County, paid the salary of a
full-time, year-round employee to protect
and patrol the watershed area to prevent
excess waste disposal and contamination
of the Poudre River—an early example of
watershed monitoring and protection that has
matured into a full-fledged profession and the
“waterkeeper” movement.36
With the water source secured, Fort Collins
turned its attention to other water-related
concerns. Since the first public water system
began in 1882, the City had met relentless
population growth with technological
solutions and budgetary allocations to meet
its water needs. As development expanded
in the region, the City Council passed an
ordinance in 1924 allowing the creation of
outside water districts in new development
areas surrounding the city—a decision that
would prove prescient as the urban growth
area spread beyond the utility’s service area
in the 1960s. As the population grew and
moved beyond the city limits and services,
Fort Collins could not provide water services
to these new neighborhoods. The ordinance
also stipulated that only tax-paying residents
within the city limits should benefit from the
City’s infrastructure. Developers created the
water districts with consideration of where
Fort Collins would expand and shouldered
the costs of bringing water service to the new
neighborhoods.37 Because City leaders chose
not to provide water services to these areas,
it would have to contend with the long-term
consequences of lack of control and oversight
at its margins.
understood sanitation issues immediately
loomed. At the pump house, sand filtration
offered only a physical, not a chemical,
treatment of the drinking water. This system
satisfied Fort Collins residents until another
crisis heightened public awareness. A typhoid
outbreak from 1900 to 1901 sparked fear
throughout town. State Board of Health
bacteriologist, Dr. William C. Mitchell of
Denver, investigated the potential sources of
the disease from the Fort Collins water supply
to dairy farms to various points along the
Poudre River. By testing water throughout the
town for bacteria and tracing typhoid victims,
his study concluded that the outbreak resulted
from the actions of a nurse in Bellvue who
had dumped contaminated waste into a ditch
that led to the Poudre River. Typhoid bacteria
in the water reached the pump house and
dispersed the organism through town. As a
result, a discussion about the location of the
city’s water intake ensued.26
In December 1900, Dr. Mitchell recommended
that Fort Collins stop diverting water from
its present location in favor of a higher
diversion point, ideally off the main stem of
the Poudre River above its confluence with
the North Fork. He specified this area because
the land surrounding that headgate “could be
purchased and preserved free from intrusion
by campers, and such a supply would offer
immunity against typhoid fever.”27 Mitchell
also suggested that only updating the pump
house was insufficient because the problematic
location of the diversion was the largest factor
in the typhoid epidemic. Fort Collins citizens
were fearful as well as frustrated because
typhoid seemed to be preventable with an
improved system. City engineer William
Rist subsequently conducted a survey that
examined the cost and feasibility of moving
the main intake above the North Fork of the
Poudre River and offered options to use either
iron or wood stave pipes.28
The residents of Fort Collins felt the need
to improve their first water works as the
availability of technological solutions
increased, new scientific knowledge spread,
Hiram Prince, Colorado water commissioner (1880–1885),
former justice of the peace, Republican Colorado State
Representative in the lower house and ancestor of Fort
Collins Utilities employee Errin Henggeler.
Courtesy of Errin Henggeler
2
Development:
Harnessing Nature
1880s–1930s
This USDA map from “The Reservoir System
of the Cache la Poudre Valley” by E.S. Nettleton
shows irrigation canals in 1901.
the tailrace that directed the discharged
water. It also included the superintendent’s
1883 residence, a 1930s apple orchard, barn
and chicken house and a unique habitat of
cottonwoods and native grasses.18
In 1889, the low flow of the Poudre River
caused a water shortage for the region’s
growing communities and farms. Neighboring
ditch companies and towns, including
Greeley, accused Fort Collins of diverting
prior-appropriated water for its supply canal,
contributing to the scarcity of the resource.
Because of this, the City obtained its first water
right by purchasing the John R. Brown Ditch,
priority No. 14 on the Poudre River, from
Thomas Gilkinson. The John R. Brown Ditch’s
high priority on the Poudre River provided an
advantageous position for the town that a new
diversion could not offer. As the Poudre River’s
location and cycles dictated Fort Collins’
early settlement patterns, so too would its
many uses promote increasing settlement and
industry while invoking strong feelings about
water within the Fort Collins community that
molded the city’s character.19
Cherry Street looking east at the Town Ditch, circa 1917.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Utilities
The southeast face of the original 1882–83 pump house,
including the spillway in the background and the tailrace in
the foreground. The property is open seasonally for tours.
Courtesy of Poudre Landmark Foundation
Sept. 15, 1882, a fire burned the Keystone
Block on the southwest corner of Jefferson and
Linden streets. With two more lives lost, the
City committed to action. On Sept. 20, 1882,
the City accepted the $77,000 plan presented
by contractors Russell and Alexander of
Colorado Springs. The 1880 Welch Block fire
encouraged officials to select a location for its
water system, but it took a second structural
fire to motivate officials to agree on how to
construct the infrastructure.
The primary purpose for the new water
works was to create pressurized water for
firefighting. The drop in elevation from the
chosen location to town created insufficient
pressure for this, so officials agreed on
a pumping system to meet their needs.
Excavation for the structure, settling reservoir
and pipeline began before the end of the
year. In early 1883, pump house technology
and piping equipment arrived and building
commenced. On June 8, 1883, the recently
established board of trustees accepted the
water works from Russell and Alexander, who
hosted a dinner for the community officials to
celebrate the City’s water supply network.
Lacking an original river diversion of its
own, the City constructed a supply canal that
carried water from the river to the pump
house. Water entered the facility for two
reasons: to provide hydropower and to be
pumped into town. The water for supply was
The “water wagon” brought Poudre River water into the
expanding town where Fort Collins residents could buy
a domestic supply and avoid trekking to the river.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H19525
A hand powered water pump provided pressurized water
without the benefit of a citywide water system.
Courtesy of Rocky Mountain National Park Museum
agricultural college and the arrival of the
Colorado Central Railroad in 1877 became the
foundation for a settled farming and ranching
community and established Fort Collins as a
promising commercial and cultural hub.10
Fort Collins development progressed with
short-term solutions to meet immediate needs.
The necessities of water, food and shelter were
met quickly with raw river water, small-scale
farming and wooden structures. Implementing
long-term solutions required time and money
that the new town lacked. The community
built more wood-frame structures as Fort
Collins grew, and a town emerged on the
landscape. While the growing population used
the various local ditches for irrigation water,
residents also used the same ditches for sewage
disposal and domestic needs in their homes, a
practice which introduced the risk of disease.
Two entrepreneurs capitalized on the lack of
an in-town water supply and sold buckets of
water, first from a horse-drawn travois in 1877
and later from a water wagon by the bucket-
or barrel-full.11
These short-term solutions sustained the town
until crisis resulted in the formation of Fort
Collins’ first long-term public service project:
a city-developed water supply system. On the
night of Feb. 3, 1880, a large fire destroyed
the Welch Block on the northwest corner of
College and Mountain avenues, killing two
people. The wooden town was at high risk of
fire because of the lack of water and adequate
Franklin C. Avery (1849–1923) invested time,
ideas and money into the early development of
Fort Collins, including its water development.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H11075
1873 Avery Map of Fort Collins. Notice the “old town”
oriented toward the river, while the “new town” embraced
a modern rationale of gridded streets based on the
north-south, east-west directions.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H08092
O. Collins established Camp Collins to
Settlement:
Meeting Basic Needs
1840s–1880s
Camp Collins on the banks of the Poudre River
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H00842
that water by virtue of a plan for beneficial use,
with the goal of avoiding water waste. In times
of short supply, water users with earlier court-
decreed rights can access water before those
with junior rights. Westerners referred to this
as the Doctrine of Prior Appropriation or “first
in time, first in right.” Like all Colorado water
users, Utilities operates within this complicated
system of water law that has driven the City’s
water acquisition and administration strategies
over time.
In the 21st century, Fort Collins Water
Utilities has grown into a multipurpose entity
with interrelated departments that treat and
manage water as it travels from the mountains
to the city and is then returned to the river.
Utilities provides nearly 9 billion gallons of
water to customers in its service area, which
includes some customers outside city limits
and excludes others within it who are served
water by Fort Collins-Loveland Water District
or East Larimer County Water District. This
patchwork arrangement reveals the pattern
of city growth over time.
Fort Collins has three distinct water utilities
that, along with Light and Power, form Fort
Collins Utilities. The water utility manages
water supply, watershed health and water
resources, including water shares, distribution,
flood also scoured and cleansed the riverbed
of the heavy loads of ash and silt from the 2012
fires, leaving in its wake a purified river with
improved wildlife habitat and water quality
conditions for downstream users.
Along with environmental emergencies, the
history of Utilities reflects legislative changes,
population growth and its own evolving
management philosophy to meet the future
needs of the growing community. This short
history of those events and decisions revisits
the content of the 1983 history, From Bucket to
Basin, which tells the story from the early 1980s
to the present. This book also explains how
the water utilities in Fort Collins fit within this
story and offers a framework for understanding
past decisions and present circumstances.
Water has crucially influenced Fort Collins
development and the quality of life that
flourished within the city. From the city’s
early ditches to the Poudre Rivers’s complex
watershed and ecologically sensitive
stormwater drainage basins, the history of Fort
Collins Water Utilities—water, wastewater
and stormwater—demonstrates the relentless
challenge of managing a reliable water supply
and system of infrastructure in a semi-
arid region. Management of urban growth
with careful planning and consideration of
environmental consequences demonstrates
a significant evolution for the city since the
Covering the exposed Town Ditch, or Arthur’s Ditch, circa
1930s. Constructed in 1873 to provide for irrigation needs,
the exposed Town Ditch became a nuisance to Fort Collins
residents as the population grew. Efforts to cover the ditch to
increase public health also created jobs.
Courtesy of Fort Collins Museum of Discovery, H20073
the Poudre diversion only a few other times
Introduction
Firefighters work to contain the High Park Fire in June 2012
Courtesy of Jim Lynxwile, Poudre Fire Authority Archives