CORRESPONDENCE

New Zealand Herald, Volume XV, Issue 5064, 8 February 1878, Page 3

CORRESPONDENCE

THE WATER QL'ysTiON. TO Tlin K01T01!. .Sil:,—The reports of the -irncetilings of the City Council nsa-illy publish.-d tail to convcv to your rwilers ;iu :i.;cur, , it'j idea of the opiiiions o.xpr<:s«o<l Uy th-; raombers of that body when .liscussing sumo of the mnst importaut iniitttrs de.'ib v.itii by tlietu, othc-rwiso your correspondent of this morning (•' Uatopayur"') would not liiivo roijuired U-α explanation of anything .'lat was said at the last meeting. As your correspondent lias referred to me '*y namo, I crave per mission to state here wh-\t I did say on the occasion referred to. IVi-hap* he. an-1 others who are conecrneil *-ill be somewhat caliphtened when they sec tho <litt'.jrenc<: between theoretical opinions and actual facts. The question was—ls it desirable to drive the purapiug-engines for .-. few days at their highest speed in order to ascertain the maximum quantity of water they could pour into the reservoirs in a ijiven time ? I said, " Whsn these works were undertaken most people were under the impression that the engines, reservoirs, pines, &c, were of sulGcient power and capacity to supply a population of seventy to eighty thousand people, but unless the engines can be driven twice as fast as is now being doue, you will Unci that, before the population numbers forty thousand, you will have to provide new engines and other plant, as thu present ones will bo inadcijuate to perform the work required to be done." Nominally (that is without allowing for friction) these enyines ought to raise one milliou of gallons in eitjliS hours ; but for the six months they have been at work they have raised only half a million gallons iu eight hours. The return* furnished by the working engineer show thai from tho Ist of June to the 24th of December last year, the engines were working four hundred and six hours, and in thai time raised twenty-live million gallons of water, whereas they ouyht to have raised nearly twice that quantity, and I think it is high lime for us to see whether they are 0.-.pablo of lining it. From a return furnished by the Council s tr.-asurer it appears that the cost of supplyin" the city with the twenty-tivo million "allons before referred to has been one thousand four hundred au.i six pounds, or at the rate :>f thirteen pence halfpenny per thousand gallons. Some time ago Mr. Krrmgtou. at the request of the Council, sent in an estimate of the annual .MSS of supplying the present population of thn city with water. It is as follows :—lntimating the population at lifteen thousand, and allowing titty gallons per head p-r day, t'.ie workiug expenses (including a fair allowance- for wear and tear) ought not to eweed two thousand live hundred ami lifty poumls per annum. Anyoun can, if they arc so inclined, put these fi.i;uivs together, nud they will lind that, according to-Mr. I'rrington, waterought tu be .supplied iu the city at an actual (iiiiUy of twopence fatt-hiug per thousand gallons, or one-sixth part of the money that it now costs ; or put in another way, six times the quant:tv of water that is now being supplied to the city ea-.i be hO supplied without increasing tho present ex-p-.-mliture. As it has taken four hundred and six hour:; to supply twenty-live millions of gallons, it follows chat the engines wouid have to be kept at work fourteen hours per day on every w.irkiti; day throughout the year to supply tho wants of the present p ipuktion, that is if Mr. I'.fiington's estimates are to be relied nn. Gentlemen, 1 think I have said chough to show how n.-ee.-sary it is that this trial should b-made. U'e ought to know what amount of work t'aese engines and ifimps are capable of performing. As to th»cost of working. Mr. lOrrington designed, supervise.l the construe tion, and is KtiU chief engineer iu charge of the waterworks, and if there is any useless expenditure going on in connection witli them, he ought to point it out. One thing is very clear to my mind-—either bis estimates" are utterly worthless, or tlie city funds are being uselessly squandered by those whose duty it is to prevent it. Mr. 1-Mitor, the motion that the trial of the engines should be made, was carried. 1 may add that, if your reporter had said as much about the actual cost of pumping as he did about the theorist's estimate, viz., lSitl v. 'i.id, no one would have been mystified, and this letter would not have been written. -T am, &0., it- DIUKSCi.V.