DEVONPORT AFFAIRS.

Auckland Star, Volume LVII, Issue 129, 2 June 1926, Page 10

DEVONPORT AFFAIRS.

■ I REVIEW OF YEAR'S WORK. MAYOR MEETS RATEPAYERS. WATER. SUPPLY QUESTION. A meeting of ratepayers of Devonport, convened by the Mayor and councillors of that borough in order to explain what had been accumplished during the past —ar. was held in the Parish Hall Is st r.icrht The hall was comfortably filled, and Mr. T. Lamont, the M-j-r, gave a thorough review. The other councillors, with the exception of Messrs. Hislop and Napier, who could not attend, were present on the platform, Mr. Lamont first dealt with the general account, stating that the. receipts amounted to £20,520, the balance, on hand being £1830. This balance was made up of £1200 for heavy traffic motor vehicle licenses, and.£63o received from the fire brigade carnival funds. During the year there had been the erection of plant shed and store at the quarry and a new culvert at Lake Road, storm water drains 850 ft, sewer drains .1300 ft, waterworks connections and extension and domestic supplies 4000 ft- and general streets maintenance, including carriageways and footpath-. The total amount expended on these ■■ viks was £5000. Other Works. In addition to this there were loan works—concrete . paving laid equal 3 1-5 miles of carriage ways, bituminous macadam 11,600 square yards, kerbing and channelling laid 3J miles, storm water drains laid 55.90 ft, 7550 ft of pipes were re-laid, and 2270 ft of new mains installed. There was also the rslaying of the supply mains in Takapuna borough and Stanley Bay Park filling, and the erection of.the fire station and cemetery reserve loan carriage way formation 6000 square- yards, kerbing and channelling 3600 ft, storm water drain laid 1550 ft, water supply pipes 3600 ft, and sewer drains laid 3300 ft. There were, said" the Mayor, also many other smaller works which he need not trouble enumerating.- It might be rather interesting to know that the first contract let for concrete roading amounted to £22,000, and it took over two years to complete. The present contractors had on hand works to the value of £55,000, and it was fully expected they would have their work completed in one year and nine months from the time of commencing. This ..,was equal to more than 2* times the amount of work done in about three-quarters of the time. He was sure they would agree that this was very satisfactory indeed, because it lessened the time "that people were incon- ; venienced with getting backwards and forwards to their homes or business premises, as the case might be. Water Supply. Respecting the question of water supply, the total revenue from this was £8480. He had already mentioned some of the more important undertakings completed during the year, but he considered it was a fitting and proper time to bring before ratepayers the question of either augmenting the water supply to the lake or finding an entirely new source of supply. The North Shore Boroughs Water Board, which replaced the old Lake Board of Control, took over the question of water supply for the North Shore boroughs one year ago, and it was their intention to provide water not only for Devonport but for the four Xorth Shore boroughs. The normal level of the lake is 14ft above sea-level. At the present time it was Ift 10in, and three weeks ago it was as low as llin above sea level. That proved that they could not depend upon the lake supply as at present existing. The previous Lake Board of Control realised this in 1923, and made application at that time to the Minister of Public Health to obtain authority to turn the Wairau Stream into Lake Pupuke, and he wished, to emphasise the fact that he was not a member of the Lake Board of Control, and had nothing whatever to do with the decision of augmenting the lake supply with the Wairau Stream. The scheme prepared at that time was to construct settling tanks on the edge of the lake and allow sediment to settle before the water was allowed to enter. It was also intended to chlorinate this . water before it was allowed to mix with the water in the lake. In drawing the water off again it would be de-chlorinated and a dechlor plant would have been installed to extract the superfluous chlorine from the water, and thus eliminate any taste or flavour of chlorination that the water may have. It would not be necessary to purchase more than one acre uf land, and the whole scheme was estimated lo cost not more than £10,000. From gauges put in the Wairau Stream at different periods it was learned that 400,000 gallons of water could be turned into the lake during the flood periods only, in winter time. The present volume of water used by the four boroughs amounts to less than 350,000,000 gallons per annum, so you see it would not be necessary to use very much bf the water from this stream. Opposition to Wairau Stream. When he became a member of the North Shore Boroughs' Water Board, and was elected chairman, the board took up the work (that was last June) where its predecessors had left off, but immediately it was made public that there was an intention to use the Wairau Stream a great deal of opposition was shown, and he, as the chairman of the board, called a meeting of all the councillors and mayors of the four North Shore boroughs to ask Urem to decide the question, and it was unanimously agreed that the Wairau Stream should not be used. Mr. Lamont assured all that, as a ratepayer, he did not like the idea of water from the Wairau Stream being turned into Lake Pupuke, but after consultation with men whose busi-1 ness it is to understand the purification of water he was compelled to admit that the Wairau Stream augmentation would be quite satisfactory in every respect and would solve the water problem for the North Shore boroughs for many years to come. Doctors Thresh and Beale. considered the greatest authorities on water purification in any part of the world, and their definition of pure and wholesome water was that it may be a. sewage effluent chlorinated and filtered. He impressed upon them most emphatically, that, while he had explained the matter, he would not propose the augmentation of- the lake from the Wairau Stream. He merely mentioned these facts, not to justify himself, because it was not his proposal, but to exonerate those gentlemen who were members of the Lake Board of Control when it was decided to augment the lake with the water from the Wairau Stream. It was a big question and one that required a i good deal of "fniirinration.