The Metropolitan Waterworks Museum at Chestnut Hill pumping station, Boston, USA

Abstract

The Metropolitan Waterworks Museum in Boston, Massachusetts, USA, occupies the engine room of the former Chestnut Hill high-service pumping station. This paper begins with an overview of the development of metropolitan Boston’s water system, which has always emphasised clean controlled sources and minimal processing. It describes the evolution of this architecturally significant building and its equally significant steam pumping engines over its 92-year operating life from 1888 to 1980. The subsequent approximately 30-year-long stakeholder process that led to the site’s preservation and the museum’s creation is reviewed, including the multilayered web of legislation, land-use agreements and particularly an underlying land disposition agreement, together with restrictions, easements, physical constraints, realpolitik considerations and the multiple operating-fund provisions that have made the museum’s successful creation and operation possible. Lastly, this paper cites some ongoing challenges.