DRAINAGE, SEWAGE, AND THE PRESS.

Otago Daily Times, Issue 4169, 29 June 1875, Page 3

DRAINAGE, SEWAGE, AND THE PRESS.

TO THK KDITon. Sin—" Can you direct me to the schoolmaster's house?" ;isks a stranger of a coal-miner in the P.lack Country. '• Nt>a. but 1 can poonch thy 'eail for tbee," is the polite reply. Equally civil and clever is your response to the appeal City Councillors made for such assistance on the subjects of drainage and sewage as the Press could give. And yet it is quita fair to expect, aud ought to be quite possible for yt>u to gather and publish information of a most useful kind. Extracts on the subject from newspapers and magazines of the day, comliiunicatioiie from scientific men and others in this community, and even your own comments ou such articles as they appear in your columns, might be a great public advantage. Should the sewage of the city be discharged with the drainage into the Bay, or into the ocean : should it be pumped over the sand-hills or collected by proper sanitary appliances and conveyed by rail to the country ; should it l.c utilised for iirigation by gravitation over some of the rich fiats, or by pumping over some of the poorer, and, therefore, more suitable hilly lauds near the town ': And where is a sufficient area of such land to be obtained most conveniently V what are the systems being adopted and abandoned in older towns '{ These and many similar questions all demand careful preliminary consideration. And this should not be lost sight of, that a thorough system of drainage will necessitate a special loan and rate for the purpose which will about double the present city taxation. To adopt hastily any emde scheme might not only lead to a serious waste "of population, but of public funds, and the time seems approaching when we may have more of one than of the other.— Yours, &.C, , M. C.C. Dunedin, -20th June, 1875.