Inventing a paradigm of piped water: the evolution of urban water concessions on the European continent, 1800-1970

European foundries master the art of mass-producing cast iron pipes in the early 1800s (Cast Iron Soil Pipe Institute 2006:1). Slow sand filters, buried pipes with bell and spigot joints, steam powered pumps, and water towers make for a universally applicable technology for urban water supply. Piped water systems enjoy a long service life and modest operational costs but require high initial outlays of capital. Also, pipe laying raises complex right-of-way issues (Meidinger 1980). Around 1850 it is by no means certain that buried water infrastructure can hold its own against contending modes of urban water supply. Cost-wise it certainly cannot compete against local water sources such as shallow wells and canals. By 1900 however, piped supply is establishing itself as the dominant source of domestic water in European and North American cities. Seventy years on, piped networks are the sole source of urban domestic water.i A parallel network of buried sewers carries the large volumes of piped water away from urban homes. How do piped water and waste technologies come to dominate domestic water regimes in European and North American cities? An early literature attributed the rise of urban piped water and sewerage to an unfolding understanding of the nature of waterborne disease (Baker 1949). Subsequent investigations by urban environment historians show that public health concerns play a minor role only in early 19th century decisions to embrace piped water infrastructure (Juuti and Katko, 2005; Millward 2004; Tarr et al. 1984; Troesken and Geddes 2003). The introduction of piped water supply, in enabling householders to install waterborne waste removal systems, may arguably even have aggravated waterborne disease (Tarr et al. 1984).ii Urban environment historians place the rise of piped water against a background of rapid industrial and population growth in European and North American towns. The environmental stress accompanying 19th century industrialisation triggers a crisis of urban water and waste that literally overwhelms city administrations (Tarr 1996). National and state governments respond by, late in the 19th century, enacting laws and regulations that place responsibility for solving the crisis in urban public health on the shoulders of municipal administrations. City administrations respond by committing to large-scale and centralised technologies for handling urban water and waste. Much of the research published in English focuses, rather unsurprisingly, on the United States and Britain. This article attempts to complements our understanding of the emergence of the piped water paradigm with evidence from the European continent. Here, as elsewhere, waterworks are pioneered by private entrepreneurs under municipal concession contracts. Early concessions confer a limited degree of market power to concessionaires. In most cases the concession amounts to no more than a permit to bury piped systems in municipal soil. Gradually waterworks concessions grow in scope. The public health legislation underlying these arrangements provides concessionaires with a virtual monopoly on domestic water supply in the city. The next two sections sketch the development of piped water and sewerage technologies and the increasing involvement of municipalities with piped supply. Section four turns to the central argument. I show how the deepening commitment of municipal administrations to piped water occasions a shift in the legal brief under which concessionaires operate and the consequences this has for domestic water provision in the city. The final section summarises key points.