CITY WATER SUPPLY

Dominion, Volume 13, Issue 306, 20 September 1920, Page 5

CITY WATER SUPPLY

Sir—Your correspondent, Or. H. Baylfss, is quite right in pointing out the (oily of bringing water from the Orongorengo River 27 miles wiflh great iron, mains to Wellington. Tho tunnel alone should condemn tho scheme, .as tho first big shako will burst up this length of piping, oml if anything happened tx> the , tunnel Wellington would be cut! off. Tho * schemo will cost more Hko be-: foro it is finished. Tho rates will bo so heavy that tho business men will more than over livo at Day's Bay, Johnsonville, Lower Hutt, EeMaunga, and Upper Huti 1 , which are all being doveloped for residential purposes, leaving tho poor to carry the burden of Wclliington. These places will got tho biggest boom they havo lind for years and Wellington will get a set-back which may bo disastrous t» its growth. The people who have to pay do not plan these absurd eohem.es. The Wainui water reserve Of >1200 acrcs, with another couple of dams would do tho city for many years, and if 5000 or 6000 acres of the Happy Valley hills wore bought for a few thousands of tho million the Orongorongo scheme wild cost 1 have no doubt Uhat water for tho next 100 years, sufficient to simply a city of 1,000,006 people, could be got for a paltry .£150,000. I know a gully myself south of "Wellington two mjles long, adjoining Karon reservoir, which would double the supply therein at a total cosi ; of ,£20,000. Then thero are three other gullies such as Happy Valley Stream, which everybody in Wellington knowß would supply tlie whole of Wand Bay, Berhampere, and Brooklyn at hijfli pressure. But probably these ore too near Wellington, not enough engineering about them, and green fields aro always far awftv. —T. ani. oto,. ' CIVIS.