Big Lighting Power Plant

BIG LIGHTING POWER PLANT

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Is Now Being Projected for This City

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NEW DAMN TO BE BUILT

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It Will Stretch Across Huron River Where Old McMahon Dam Now Stands

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If plans which are now under way are carried out successfully,  Ann Arbor will be the centre of one of the largest lighting power plants in the state of Michigan. Considering the number of towns that it is proposed that the projected plant will light, the undertaking, when completed, will be one of the largest in the country.

A project is under way to build a new dam across the Huron river, where the old McMahon dam now stands. The land has already been surveyed and from present indications the work of building the dam will be carried to a successful finish. The new dam is to extend clear across the land from the railroad tracks to the river. It is the intention to bring the Huron river up to within, six feet of the Michigan Central railroad tracks. This will back the water up as far as Neff's dam, to which place the surveying has extended. It is also planned to completely lower the Foster and other intervening dams.

The Washtenaw Power company is said to be behind the project.

The new dam will toe built woth a view of supplying water both in summer and winter. The new structure will give a capacity of 500 horse power, which will be used in Jackson, Grass Lake, Chelsea, Dexter, Ann Arbor and Ypsilanti.

The Huron river is adapted as no other river in Michigan to the building of dams, having in its course hundreds of water falls and other elements which make it easily harnessed.

Prof. Davis, of the engineering department of the University, is in charge of the surveying, preliminary to the work of building.