York County, PA Water Table Trend
York County, PA: what the water table is actually doing
York County's representative monitoring well shows depth to water rising, getting shallower over time, a fitted trend of 1.3 ft per decade over 40 years of readings.
One well stands in for York County's whole aquifer here, the honest simplification every page on this site carries.
What the well actually measured
The most recent reading put water 20.6 ft below land surface. Readings span 1986-05-18 to 2026-08-10, 216 measurements from USGS well USGS-400916076492301 (Yo 1147 York County Observation Well), part of the National Water Information System. The qualifying bar and the OLS fit behind this trend are documented in the methodology guide.
Where York County ranks
Of the 1,449 US counties with a usable trend, York County ranks 204th from fastest-rising to fastest-declining, 1 is the fastest-rising water table measured, 1449 the fastest-declining. About 471,240 people live in York County, Pennsylvania. See the fastest-moving counties guide for how York County stacks up against the most extreme cases nationally.
A dropping table says nothing about water quality
Whether York County's water table is rising or falling is independent of what's actually in the water. Depletion can concentrate naturally-occurring minerals, so it's worth checking directly with a water test rather than assuming a depth trend says anything about quality.