Ypsilanti Water Works Stand Pipe

The Ypsilanti Water Tower notes the origin of a city-owned water-works in Ypsilanti, and marks its continuing service for ninety years as a water source and a civic landmark. In the 1880s a number of Michigan cities, including Lansing, Ann Arbor, and Kalamazoo developed or purchased their own water-works system. William R. Coats, an engineering consultant on both the Lansing and Kalamazoo water-works, came to Ypsilanti in the fall of 1887 to review that city's capacity to develop a public water supply. He found '... everything favorable for the most complete success ... ' An April 1888 near-unanimous vote by the citizenry bonded the city for $75,000 to develop a water-works system. Initial plans called for the laying of ten miles of street mains, a small steam pumping plant, and an elevated reservoir. The discovery of an excellent water-power source, already equipped for service, made officials purchase an industrial water power source, abandoning plans for the steam pumping plant. In October 1888 city officials bought nineteen acres of land owned by the Ypsilanti Paper Company, its power plant, out-buildings, water-wheels and a 300 horsepower Corliss engine with a $26,000 outlay. As work progressed, residents clamored for an extension of the street mains to link the entire city with the reservoir. A special election in the spring of 1889 authorized an additional $75,000 for street main construction, resulting in a total street main distribution of nearly 18 miles. Completed on February 3, 1890, the water tower and supporting pump station cost a total of $143,071.70 to construct. In the First Annual Report of the Ypsilanti Board of Water Commissioners, building engineer William R. Coats lavishly praised '... the farsighted Ypsilantians who bore the cost of such a functional and aesthetic addition to the city ... ' In 1975, the American Water Works Association designated the Ypsilanti Water Tower as an American Water Landmark in Michigan, one of sixteen national sites so selected because of the tower's historical significance to the community as a water supply.

The Ypsilanti Water Tower is located on a triangular plot of land at the intersection of Summit and Cross streets, facing southeast toward Washtenaw Avenue on the edge of the Eastern Michigan University campus. It is a cylindrical-shaped structure of Joliet limestone, topped by a domed, shingled roof with cupola. Measuring 42 feet in diameter and 147 feet in height, the tower's shaft wall and three interior walls house a 250,000 gallon steel water tank which rests on a concrete foundation. Built at a cost of $21,132 as part of a civic water-works system, the tower was constructed by William R. Coats in 1890. The tower's lower segment, measuring 85 feet in height, is faced with white-colored Joliet limestone and enframes a rounded arch entry with stone voussiers. Three limestone belt courses encircle the shaft wall, while circular stone windows with square paning are visible at its upper elevation. The shaft wall is four inches thick at its grade line, and two feet thick at its top. Three stone interior walls, matching the outer wall in height and thickness, house a 250,000 gallon steel water tank built by the Detroit Water Works Company, which rests on ten inch steel I-beams. A circular oak catwalk and iron railway leads to the tower's upper segment, a domed roof of cedar shingles measuring 85 feet in height, which is topped, in turn, by a copper octagonal cupola with glazed windows. The Ypsilanti Community Utilities Authority (YCUA) has operated the water tower since 1974. Its extensive renovation by the YCUA in 1976 included roof reshingling, beam replacement and painting at a cost of $114,694, a figure five times higher than its original cost of construction.