The dry waterfall above the first pond at the Water Gardens, seen on July 6, 2026.
Every once in a while Albany’s Talking Water Gardens lure me for a bike ride on the gravel trails that wind around the ponds and waterfalls, all dry now because the water treatment function of the system has been shut off.
As you may remember, under a settlement with the Oregon Department of Environmental Quality the Gardens have not received treated wastewater since December 2024. For a time last summer, the City of Albany pumped water from Cox Creek to try to keep plants alive in the ponds.
A week ago, when I toured the Gardens on my bike, the waterfalls were not flowing, the ponds were bone dry, and most of the plants in the pond bottoms looked dead.
The city plans to resume pumping in water from Cox Creek this summer. In May I reported that a new pump had been ordered but was delayed in shipment because of supply chain problems.
On July 7 I got an update from Kristin Preston, who manages Albany Public Works operations:
“The pump has been delivered, and we are currently waiting for Pacific Power to connect and energize the new electrical service for this pump. We don’t have an estimated timeline for this and are at the mercy of their schedule. Once we have the electrical service, the pump and associated piping and parts should take a few days to a week to install and start up.”
The pump, with a capacity of about 3 cubic feet per second, is costing the city about $62,000 to buy and set up.
So, with luck, the next time the bike takes me there, I’ll see water in the ponds and on those rocks. (hh)
Blow up this photo and read how the Talking Water Gardens are supposed to work.
Even without water in the ponds, the gardens offer an opportunity to bike on the gravel trails.
Good pictures of Talking Water Gardens, Hasso….water or no water!!
This comment will make both Democrats and Republicans mad…which I think is very fair of me!! It took a long time to get the new pump for the Water Gardens because of supply chain problems. We have President Clinton to thank for that for getting the ball rolling on the U.S. giving up on manufacturing anything in our country. (Think NAFTA…North American Free Trade Act.) And, we have DJT (I can’t stand to type his full name) to thank for our supply chain problems. He never has met a ballistic missile or any explosive that he doesn’t “itch” to fire off at another country and/or at small boats in the oceans in our western hemisphere.
There is an old joke about jokes at a logging camp that were told so many times that they were numbered. So If you wanted to tell the joke you stood up and said “number 23” everyone knew the joke and would laugh, when the new guy heard of this, he stood and said “number 17″……………no one laughed, the guy next to him said hey kid, some folks just can’t tell a joke.
I have spoken so many times about this ill named treated sewer water cooling system that doesn’t really work, that I now say “NUMBER 39” I hope no one laughs because there is nothing funny about the millions used to do this thing.
I heard this joke when I was a kid, and it involved a group of fellow commuters on a train who retold jokes so many times they numbered them for convenience. Then one day, one of them called out a number, “23.” They all chuckled, as usual. But one guy laughed out loud. How come, they asked. He replied, “I had not heard that one before.”
yep , jokes get changed to fit the folks listening, I heard my version when I was going to work with my dad when a I was 10.
Good one Rick