WATER SUPPLY TO PORT CHALMERS.

Evening Star, Volume VII, Issue 1996, 28 September 1869, Page 2

WATER SUPPLY TO PORT CHALMERS.

To the Editor of the Eveninq Star. Sir, —There are two sources from which a supply of water may be had—Dunedin and Sawyer’s Bay. It is likely the Dunedin Waterworks Company would supply ' our wants for a small annual sum, providing they were not put to any expense. They should be applied to—and, if their answer be favorable, we should then employ an experienced engineer to give us the estimated cost of mains, and laying them from their mains to onr jetty. By a timely application to the Government, or to the railway company now forming, we might be allowed to lay them alongside their line. Plans and specifications for the building of a reservoir, &c., at Sawyer’s Bay, with mains from them to the jetty, with the estimated cost, should b; prepared, and the cost of the land should be estimated togetlier with estimated cost of carrying water from these mains to str. ets whose inhabitants by a majority had agreed to take a supply of water—the majority not to bo counted by numbers, but by the value of their property as assessed for. The cost of water might be equal, or more, from Dunedin than from Sawyer’s Bay, adding the annual payment; but they—the Dunedin Waterworks Company—have to maintain their reservoirs at an annual cost of LIOO or L2OO, less or more; but, wba:ever sum it may be, it our supplies are from them, we are free of that annual charge, and of all risk of our damdike being swept away by a flood The estimated cost of a supply from both places being received, and from neither place will it exceed five thousand pounds. The revenue from the streets to be supplied, and from the shipping, may be pretty clearly ascertained, and when so, if a small profit is shown over interest on the outlay, perhaps it would be desirable to g- 1 a supply for the benefit of the shipping, and the inhabitants of those streets who have agreed as aforesaid for the use of the water. But it must be expressly agreed on that assessments for water shall only be levied and paid by those residing in the streets in which water is introduced ; that the profits arising from the sale of the water shall be applied in reducing the bill of costs, or in the introduction of mains; and in other streets, when the residents therein have agreed as aforesaid to apply for water, that ttie accounts of the water works shall not be mixed up with other town business. Thos. Dalkymple.