WATER FOR AUCKLAND.

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 230, 28 September 1928, Page 8

WATER FOR AUCKLAND.

CLAIMS OF WAIKATO SCHEME

AN UNFAILING SUPPLY.

COMMENT ON DARE REPORT,

"Any soli pine to provide additional water supplies for Auckland should be provincial in scope," declared Mr. E. H. Potter, chairman of the Auckland Provincial Water Board Organisation this morning, in criticising the report on additional water supplies which was presented to the Auckland City Council last evening bv Mr. H. H. Dare, who recently made extensive investigations on behalf of the council.

Mr. Potter said that it was absurd to talk of spending £4,500,000 in developing minor water schemes in the vicinity of Auckland, when at a cost of £800,000 fifteen to twenty million gallons a day could be procured from the Lower Waikato River, or at an expenditure of £2,500.000 a similar supply could bo obtained at Arapuni, ore which would provide for all the towns en route .and could be indefinitely extended as requirements arose.

Mr. Potter said that when Mr. Bush made a report in 1924 there was no mention of outside sources or the necessity of filtration of Waitakere water. It was only when the suburban local bodies began to consider a larger scheme, one to include a much wider area, including the Waikato, that any endeavour was made by the city to look further afield. The report by Mr. Dare approved of the previous report by Mr. Bush, but Mr. Dare had candidly admitted that in some respects there had been insufficient data for him to form definite opinions. A good scheme would make ample provision for the full requirements of the driest summer. Mr. Dare was not asked to report generally on the water problem of Auckland, and the Waikato River was not included in his order of reference. Both the Lower Xihotupu and Huia schemes, which had been referred to, were pumping schemes. The Waikato water could be made perfect for a city supply, and it would be within tlio recollections of Aucklanders what the condition of the Waitakere water was before treatment.

Mr. Potter said that the Waikato scheme should have been fully investigated in view of the known limitless supply and comparison of cost. In the investigations that Mr. Dare made he. considered that detailed estimates should be prepared, and pointed out that his conclusions in regard to Hunua Ranges were only tentative and based on the slender evidence he had and present prices. A far better proposal to meet the water needs of Auckland city and surrounding districts was the Waikato River, which could be co-ordinated if necessary with the present supply from the Waitakeres.

"There is one real solution of Auckland's water problem," said Mr. Potter in conclusion. "That is to have the supply of water under the control of a board which would deal with the matter in its widest aspect."'