Representatives of the SFPUC will be holding at the Golden Gate Park Senior Center at 6:30 pm on Tuesday, September 7th to present and discuss two proposed projects.
The "Recycled Water Project" is a proposed new water treatment that would be constructed at the west end of the park between Murphy's Windmill and the Beach and Park Chalets (i.e., where the old water treatment plant used to be located). It would provide secondarily-treated water piped into it from the Oceanside Plant at the zoo with tertiary treatment for use as "non-potable water" in irrigating the plantings in Golden Gate Park. The treated water would be stored in a reservoir in the Sunset District.
The "Groundwater Project" would extract potable water from the aquifer underneath the City at approximately that same location to supplement Hetch Hetchy drinking water to the extent that it is sustainable with other current uses. Mountain Lake and Lake Merced are the surface emanations from that aquifer. Some of the waters from it are currently used by municipalities in Northern San Mateo County under an agreement with the City and County of San Francisco.
PAR President Ray Holland met with SFPUC representatives on both projects last week and was able to view renderings of the new water treatment plant that is being proposed for the west end of the park. Aesthetically, it would be an enormous improvement over the old water treatment plant at that same location where remnants of it remain. It was reported that the SFPUC intends to ensure that both projects are included within the scope of the Environmental Impact Study that the Recreation and Parks Department has reportedly requested for the Beach Chalet Soccer Fields.
