JAMAICAN RESERVOIR

Evening Star, Issue 19614, 21 July 1927, Page 15

JAMAICAN RESERVOIR

LARGE STORAGE DAM BUILT An engineering feat which will have a profound effect on tho future of Kingston, Jamaica, has just been brought to a successful conclusion by Sir W. G. Armstrong, Whitworth, and Co., Ltd. This is the building of the Hermitage dam, which was formally opened by Sir Reginald Stubbs, tho Governor of Jamaica, on May 4. The dam is situated IFi miles from Kingston, at a point 1.688 ft above sea level. It is 142 ft high to the crest, 673 ft in length, and varies in thickness from 30ft to 100 ft at the base. Tho work is surmounted by a reinforced concrete gangway providing access to the valvohouse and valve tower, in which all tho valves for controlling tho water are placed. The gangway consists of thirty-ono spans, each 15ft clear opening, providing a spillway of 465 ft in length along the crest of the dam, the top of which is curved in such a way that flood water rolls over without shock. A spillway channel is provided along the downstream side of the dam to convoy flood water back to the river bed.

The dam will impound some 500,000,000 gallons of water with a surface area of about thirty-seven acres, drawn from a drainage area above the dam of approximately six square miles. The storage reservoir so formed is intended chiefly as a reserve supply for Kingston and St. Andrew’s in periods of drought, hut will bo used to increase the water facilities in-that area. The Governor, in his inaugural address, referred to the work as the most important engineering feat yet carried out in the colony, and emphasised the great benefit which it would confer oii the community. The construction of the dam was commenced on December 1, 1924, and in spite of very heavy rainfalls and difficulties of accessy necessitating the construction of a mountain railway 2J miles in length, the work has been carried to a successful conclusion without undue incident or interruption*