PLAINS WATER SUPPLY.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVIII, Issue 5212, 5 December 1927, Page 2

PLAINS WATER SUPPLY.

THE WEST AREA SCHEME.

PROGRESS BEING MADE'.

The steel pipes for the crossing of the Waitakaruru stream .and the Wai-takaruru-Maukorp canal for the Hauraki Plains West water supply mains arrived on Thursday last, and the work of connecting was commenced immediately. The connection is probably made by now and the water available as far as Rawerawe. Fittings for the regt of the pipe-line are expected to land in New Zealand this week; and the water will most likely be available all over the area early in the new year.

These crossings have; presented some difficulty on account of future dredging work and the passage of dredges. 1011 the Maukorp Canal a deviation was necessary to allow of the dredge lifting the road bridge as .a part of its performance in going in and out. The design finally took the form of a ten-inch steel pipe 35ft long, carried in. one span over the water at a sufficient elevation io alof a clear passage of ordinary launch traffic. Expansion joints and sluice valves fitted on each end of the pipe allow of water being shut off when detaching the steel pipe for a passageway. As arranged, tlie pipeline can be broken and repaired within a few hours.

Up to the present fihe water has been available along tlitjjWaitakaruruPipiroa 'road on some occasions after the testing of tlie pipes, and farmers (rave taken the opportunity of filling their tanks and troughs. Some farmers found that their stock, which had been accustomed all their lives to drinking discoloured water, would not drink the clear fresh water until it had been coloured with a few shovelfuls of peat. At first the cattle plunged their heads into the cle,ar water, thinking that the troughs were nearly empty.