HIGH RESERVOIR

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 44, 20 August 1938, Page 10

HIGH RESERVOIR

WIRELESS RESERVE

TOP OF TINAKORI HILLS

WATER FOR STATION

During the past three years there has been much activity within the Post and Telegraph Department's reserve of approximately 75 acres at the top of the Tinakori hills.

3 j The receiving station, situated on I the city side and a little below the summit, has been very much enlarged . to cope with the increased work, and 'an extension of the transmitting . station at the fop of the hill, where . thousands of pounds' worth of delil cate and intricate wireless equipment 'is housed, has lately been made. ; Tree-planting on a big scale has been , undertaken under the supervision of : the custodian of the Chief Post Office, ■ Mr. W. H. Davey, a house has been built for the custodian of the re- [ serve, and since the end of last year ■ a.new motor road to the top has been constructed to give better and easier access from the Northland side. Much, ' therefore, has been accomplished, the development that has taken place giving the area a completely new appearance. A WATER SHORTAGE. Further work is now in hand, and at the moment this consists principally of the construction of a reinforced con- > crete reservoir near the transmitting' station. It will hold 20,500 gallons of water, which will be drawn from the city mains and pumped up from a pumping station adjacent to the roadway leading up from Northland, some 36 chains away from the top of the hill. In the past the operators on duty in the receiving and transmitting stations were dependent on the rain for their water supply, and in the dry spell last summer the increased staff on duty soon accounted for the tank water supply, and water had to be carried from the caretaker's tanks. Hence the decision to construct the reservoir. This reservoir is being built 985 ft above sea level. A better appreciation of the height may be gained by comparison with the height of Mt. Victoria —648 ft. The lift to the reservoir from the pumping station is 310 ft and the plant installed there will pump between 400 and 450 gallons of water per hour. The pumping station and the reservoir will be connected by 17 chains of 3in galvanised iron piping and then from the gate at the entrance to the reserve and up the hill by 19 chains of 2in copper piping. Wet weather has hindered the construction to some extent, but the area has been dug out and the work of putting down the floor of the reservoir is proceeding. TREE-PLANTING. The number of trees planted in the reserve has been greatly added to this year, the caretaker (Mr. J. Cowie) and his assistants having put in 11,000 more trees. When the planting for this year is completed in about a fortnight's time approximately 25,000 trees, mostly natives, will have been put in by the department. Of the trees which have been planted this year, nearly 5000 have been grown in a nursery near the caretaker's house. These young trees, grown from seedlings,. are hardy specimens, and having been reared on the spot are the more capable of resisting the strong winds to which the hillside is exposed. The trees, in spite of the windswept nature of the situation of most of them' and the fact that the soil in some places particularly is not of the best, are doing very well, the percentage of failures being very small. There are pohutukawas and other trees which have made surprisingly good growth in the past two years, and many of them are on the most exposed slopes. The growth they have made therefore is a happy augury for the success of the whole scheme. It will be a few years before the trees grow enough to clothe the hill with their fresh green foliage, but they have made a good start, and in course of time they should give the reserve a very pleasant appearance and make it an even greater attraction for visitors. that doesn't seem able to hang together for ever," I said. "It has so many minorities and they have trouble with the Slovaks as well as the Sudeten Germans. It has no national history of cohesion." "Make no mistake," he said, "the Czechs will fight for their democratic freedom, every man of them, and the knowledge of this determination, backed up by the support of the Soviet Union, has made Germany pause. That is a first-class victory for the peace of Europe." FREE MEDICAL SERVICE. I had the bad luck to fall ill in Moscow and for a week lay in a highi fever. La grippe I was told—influenza. Fortunately, medical services were free, even for tourists, and I had a specialist as well as a general practitioner and nurses who came in at night and put mustard plasters on ffie and "cupped" me. It is a medieval practice, so English doctors think, but it- is widely used in Europe to relieve congestion of the lungs. The Russian rouble is so high for tourists that prices are fantastically dear for any extras that one may need, so I was very happy to have fallen ill in a Socialist country, where I didn't - have to pay, but came under the ; general national scheme of health ser- ■ vices. But it took a slice out of my time for seeing Russia. As I lay in bed I heard, every even- i ing, a Russian squad of soldiers passing. They sang as they went, and at i last I got the interpreter to tell me : what they were singing. They sang: • "If the morrow brings war, If the foe invades, If the forces of darkness descend, ] Then at once, like one man, Will the people arise ] Our Fatherland free to defend." An Englishwoman friend came to visit me. She brought me the com- I j plete report of the Moscow trials, and I; I asked her many questions about the ! 1 feeling of the country where she had j - lived so long. "How do the women j < feel about war?" I asked. "They're prepared," she said, "but; < they don't want it. It is amazing how ; they know and understand European i politics. A group of domestic workers, ' servant girls who are not particularly i blessed with brains, talk to each other ; i in the big communal kitchen of the ] block of flats where I live. They dis- ] cuss the Spanish situation and com-: < pare it with the Russian revolution i of 1905, and they are already pre-' i pared to change their work and take j up war work if necessary. But they 1 don't want to. They want to keep j out of war. It's true. In this coun- 1 try where the Red Army is so marvel- ] lously trained and ready the general i disposition is against war. You can ■; feel it in every conversation you y have." r "I can take that as the ordinary Russian point of view?" I asked. c "Emphatically." -\