WATER FOR KARORI

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 102, 4 May 1925, Page 6

WATER FOR KARORI

IN A FORTNIGHT'S TIME

FIRST DELIVERY OF ORONGOKONGO PIPES.

Karori is to have a water supply in a fortnight or three weeks' time, for, although Orongorongo^water is still a long way from the Karori Reservoir, the Waterworks Department of the Corporation is now completing the laying of a short length of four-inch main to connect the Karori reticulation system with mains leading from the Northland and Kelburn reservoirs, to which water is pumped from the Aro street station. Tho junction is being effected- by laying a few chains of piping across the Wilton Valley road to the Old Karori road and Stirling terrace, where the new Karori' vmains are joined. The Northland and Kelburn reservoirs are at a very fair height, 678 ft above sea level, but that is not a sufficient height to ensure a flow of water to the highest levels of Karori. Residents on these levels, then, must depend upon their tank supplies, until such time as the special high level reservoir for Karori (at about 750 ft or 760 ft above sea level) is supplied from the Orongoron<'oKarori main. The supply from the Northland and Kelburn reservoirs is a temporary expedient only, and will be- replaced by ■a much more ample supply when tho new steel main is completed. The fourinch main, it is considered, will afford a fair supply for Karori during the winter months, particularly as a number of houses are not yet ready to use a city supply. TTIIS AND PAST SUMMERS. The first of the 21-inch steel pipes for the Orongorongo-Karori main were delivered by the contracting company at Wainui on Thursday evening. A sixwheeled wagon-trailer was used to convey them out and difficulty was experienced in a creek in the valley; but the first pipes were delivered, even though the hour was late. Strangely enough, though the Morton dam level has been very uncomfortably low in recent past summers, the Waterworks Engineer at no time had need to worry during the past summer and autumn, for the overflow never ceased. The insurance against a water shortage—tho two and a half miles of pipe connecting the Orongorongo stream, through the tunnel, to the Wainui valley and storage dams—was there, but it was not necessary to open the valley. This was a very different state' of affairs to the autumns of. 1917 and 1919; i v 1917 the Morton dam was empty when the rain came and in May, 1919, only a fortnight's supply remained. FOR SEATOTJN HEIGHTS. _ Levels are now being taken and drawings prepared for the water and drainage reticulations, for Seatoun Heights tor winch work the council has received from tlie Board of Health authority I to borroNv £26,000.