It's A Water Feature, Not A Washing Machine Agitator

This morning we noticed that someone had dumped some Ultra detergent into the fountain at Cal Anderson Park, which made a bunch of pretty foam, but which perturbed us because we weren't sure if that was getting into our drinking water. The park, as you might already know, is basically a very cool lid for the reservoir that sits underneath it.

But we weren't sure how it all worked, so we called the Parks & Recreation department to find out. They were out in the field, rather than hovering by the phones, so we then tried Tetra Tech/KCM, who actually worked on the reservoir part of the project. (That's right, a blogger picked up a phone and called someone. We felt like a real gumshoe.) They turned us on to a city official, Andy Ryan.

Ryan told us that the water feature is, thankfully, separate from the reservoir tanks, and there is a chemical disinfection process that the above-ground water goes through as it recirculates. But in any event, the park doesn't recommend the fountain as a wading pool, a play area for diapered tots, a nice way for dogs to cool off, or free for public laundry. There are some minuscule signs to that effect, which apparently are for liability's sake.