Nelson Evening Mail. MONDAY, SEPT. 7, 1903. DRAIVAGE V. SEWAGE.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XXXVII, Issue 162, 7 September 1903, Page 2

Nelson Evening Mail. MONDAY, SEPT. 7, 1903. DRAIVAGE V. SEWAGE.

FORESHORE POLLUTION. EXPERIENCES OF MELBOURNE and Auckland.

THE citizens of Nelson have only a week in which they „: v decide tl.e momentous question whether they shall commit themselves^ to devoting their foreshore and harbour to the purposes of sewage discharge or whether by rejecting a project for which even its warmest advocates have to apologise as an economical alternative they should secure a more comprehensive, safer, and less experimental system. Much has been said in these columns from time to time to convey a local warning against the further pollution of the foreshore of the city Against the arguments used statistics of fever in the city have been quoted officially and authoritative ly to show that better and more complete drainage is absolutely necessary—a proposition which no one attempts to deny. But it may be left to the careful reader of the appended facts and deductions from' two places which have drained on to their foreshores and harbours to decide whether it would be safe for the future of Nelson to be left to

the chances 'Of tho Mestayer scheme. The t\Vo places referred to are Melbourne and Auckland,, and the data are culled from a leading article in the Auckland "Herald," which is agitating for drainage extension into practically the open sea instead of into the various "boys of the harbour. • • • » Melbourne drained into tho Yarra and on to -its foreshores for many years, till its outskirts became malodorous and its health very bad. Comparing Melbourne with Auckland in regard to similarity of conditions, the "Herald" says :— "We always regard Melbourne as a great centre of over half-a-million people, but the 'City" numbers only 67,550. There is a furt-ifr" si-. milarity in Melbourne having once upon a timo attained that unenviable notoriety for Ir.surilt ation and avoidable unheait.i'. if'is which seems to be tJ c ambition . f Avt.kland at the present epoch. Tn the lustrum ending with 1890, Melbourne had reached the alarming average annual death-rate of 19.4 per 1000. By 1896, *\he had reduced this to 15.96 per 1000, and at the close of last year to 14.59 pel' 1000. Put into facts, Melbourne is already saving between 300 and 400 lives every year by the sanitary improvements upon which she entered. Many thousands of her citizens are now enjoying health and strength ! who would have died and been forI gotten had the old -system been per- ■ sisted in. And an incalculable proportion of her population has been I made stronger, healthier, and hap- ' pier than they could otherwise have '. been. The experience of Melbourne 1 may be duplicated in Auckland, if Vve will hut put our drains and our j Water supply into proper order and j stop giving again — exchanging, it is termed — our breezy public breathing grounds FOR ' SWAMrY HOLLOWS. "- •.*•»■ Till 1889 the death rate of Melbourne rose'jerkingly upwards, just as the death rate at Auckland is lifting (Says the "Herald") thti cause being obviously the increasing saturation of the whole city tfufc to drainage being poured on to THE MUDFLATS' AND LOW-LY-ING FORESHORES surrounding the Yarra. Let it be reh'ehibei'ed that tlie Yarra at the points where the sewage entered ft is deep enough for small craft to ply, and for some miles it is a creek, or inlet of the Sea, the water being NOT FRESH BUT BRACKISH, IF NOT.ACTUALLY SALT. Melbourhe has had almost complete reticulation for nearly half a century. That is lb say, during her worst period of high death rate the city possessed to the full the advantage It, is claimed Nelson will secure by the JwyiVkg of pipes to a point of concentrated outflow. But, as it is proposed to do in Nelson, the sewage effluent was into the river and thence it saturated the shore, with the result that it has'becn found absolutely Hece'ssary to insTHute an extension of a deep drainage system. In 1889 the actual death rate ,of Melbourne was as high as 21.49 per cent compared with- only 17.7 in London. Then came the reform movement — THE DEEP DRAINAGE EXTENSION — • and in three years the dea)fc rate of Melbourne was amongst tho best instead of the Woi'fet df tile great cities bf the \Vbrld. The official repbl'fc of the Melbourne Metropolitan Sewerage Board says :— "As to- the Typhoid mortality, it has fallen so greatly and steadily of late years that it Is hdt only lower than that of the average English town, but is as_ low as that of London, which has for long been regarded as pl-Bviriing- a standard to bb aimed at. . . We are justified at least for the present, in believing that the great lowering' of mortality from Typhoid, seen in the three years especially, is largely ascribable to the e*tehsibii bf Die BEEP DiUiNAGk SYSTEM." Commenting on the foregoing the Auckland "Herald," representing a city that' drains largely, intti iH harbour and which desires to use the open sea, declares :— "This js surely a lesson to Auckland, or must we wait for Melbourne's experience before we are compelled to take sanitary action?" » # • • "" "The moral taught td Nelsdn by thfe aiJundaiit evidence of many great cities is : Firstly that deep,, even strongly running water strong ly impregnated with !he salt of the deep sea is essential with regard to a sewage effluent; «ve!i WiieH that rtfrw.elit is the uhfilttred liuqid from the first process of a septic tank as proposed in Nelson. The septic tiinks mi o ted iii the circular issued l\V the Mnybr io-day probably have complete systems; and their overflow is a FILTRATE, not a mere EFFLUENT as proposed in Nelson. The septic tank as such alone is NOT A , PtIRIFIER-i't is only a LIQUIFIER. Secbiicily, that deep dl-afhdge extension, that is to say, the open sea, is still the best method in spite of new-fangled notions and experiments. Thirdly, that mere drainage connections are of small avail if the outflow from those connections pollute a foreshore or a harbour round which the connected dwellings Sri} built * * * Turn whither we may, in search of data, we find that in our battle of to save the front of the city and the city itself from the risk of sewage contamination we have as onr allies the experience of places which have done and deeply regretted having done that whielj j$ j S . proposed to do in Nelson. Bet 'the ratepayers take warning while there is yet time, and not be led away by the fatally specious argument 'that befcause they may get drainage connections where now there is none therefore the city will be better drained. The true solution of the problem is not in the mere removal of sewage from several points to a point of concentration, but in tho removal to a point of conce.at"ration far distant from all danger and under the action of Nature's scavenger, the ocean. Even accommodating septic tanks so oa"e 1 and which apparently do not require in Nelson filtration as fhev do most assuredly in other places cannot take precedence of Nature hi this regard, it is hoped that the experiences of Melbourne and the wfi7 1 i nfi L being P re P ai ' cd at Auckland will be borne in mind by the ratepayers, and that they will not permit themselves to be led astray by side issues-. y * * . No one objects to DRAINAGE • All should object to SESV\GF, FN" DANGERING the FORESHORE. "