THE DRAINAGE SCHEME.

New Zealand Times, Volume XXXII, Issue 5226, 21 December 1877, Page 3

THE DRAINAGE SCHEME.

Mr, Climie has addressed the following letter to the Chairman and members of the Drainage Committee, Wellington;— “ Gentlemen, —Certain statements are made in a letter dated the 27tb ult., from Mr. C. Napier Bell to the Mayor, which I think require some comment by me. Before referring to them I wish to draw your attention to a remark by Mr. Bell in a letter to the Town Clerk, returning the plans. He says:—‘By mail I send the plans for the drainage scheme, which please deliver to the Mayor, from whom I received them.’

“ I desire to point out that I gave the plans to Mr. Bell, and that they did not pass through the hands of the Mayor. The day Mr. Bell left Wellington ha called at my office to let me know what plans he required, and when he declined to take tracings and wished to be provided with ‘paper drawings,’ I said he could have the originals on condition that they were returned to me when he sent in his report. I took the plans to the steamer, and the Mayor, who was conversing with Mr. Bell, left when I arrived, and did not and could not know the number or description of the plans I delivered.

“ I should not have noticed this matter but for the significant conclusion of his letter to the Mayor—‘ I must request your Worship to give them (the plans) to Mr. Clarke just as they are,’ &c. A man who would insinuate that I would tamper with plans is not, I think, entirely to be trusted. But I have not yet had an opportunity of seeing my plans since their return.

“ I really find very little to answer in Mr. Bell’s letter, because he has deemed it expedient so to modify the objections with which his first report teemed that lie himself now styles them mere trifles. If they were trifles they should not have been brought forward and published. He estimated the cost of works at about £40,000 more than I did, and the interest on this, at 6.V per ceut., would be about £2600 per annum, a sum which I do not think the ratepayers would consider a trifle, not to speak of the re-payment of the principal. However, he now meekly says that he will not be too positive on this point. “Then he admits that he exaggerated the subsoil water when he put it down as twothirJs of the whole sewage, and in the largest sewerage works he has quoted the proportion of subsoil water is but one-fifth. I think that one-twentieth would be nearer the mark for Wellington. It is to be regretted that he did not look up his authorities before making a random and exaggerated statement on so important a subject. He admits that the pumps, which he asserted constituted so serious an objection, by reason of their valves being liable to be choked by old hats and trowsera, have no valves, and possibly he may discover the buckets to be as illusory as the valves. The damming back of the sewage, which was certainly the chief objection in his report, is now, he says, hut a trifle. It would have been no trifle had I not provided means to prevent such a catastrophe. “ I think I am justified iu saying that Mr. Cell has substantially acknowledged his former objections to be more visionary than real. “ He says I accused him of ‘ Ignorance, misrepresentation, and prejudice,’ but I certainly never wrote such words iu my report. I merely gave plain facts, leaving it to the committee to draw conclusions. However, from the course Mr. Bell has taken, it is a question whether I would have been far wrong in using those or similar words. “ Being anxious to learn his opinion on my scheme, I asked him, when at my office the day he left, whether the design would require any material alteration, and he replied ‘that he thought not, hut some of the details might require to be slightly altered or modified,’ Having received such an assurance I naturally expected that, according to the custom of consulting engineers, he would point out to me the modifications he deemed desirable. Therefore I was indeed greatly astonished when I saw his report in the newspaper condemning the whole scheme as impracticable. After such conduct I am unable to plac? reliance upon anything he may say, at all events in connection with the drainage of Wellington. “ It must, I think, be patent to all that he desires to bring forward a scheme of his own, and having condemned mine by a string of imaginary objections, he no doubt thought the field was open. He has deemed it necessary to state that he is not a competing engineer, but it is no secret that he has a plan for discharging the sewage into the bay. Of this I accused him in my answer to his report and he has not ventured to deny it, I was, of course very properly, precluded from devising any scheme for discharging the sewage into the bay. “Mr. Bell talks largely about seeing that the city has a better article than that submitted by me, apparently forgetting that having condemned the scheme he was to consult upon, it, so far as he is concerned, is defunct, and therefore it wou’d be superfluous to retain his services longer. The fact is, it was from the first a misnomer to call him a consulting engineer, for, notwithstanding his protestations, his conduct has been that of an opponent. I believe there is no instance on record of an engineer of standing and respectability, who, having been called in to consult aa to the best mode of carrying out details, attempted to foist a design of his own after being furnished with plans, sections, and details—thus, in short, sucking another man’s brains. What would bo thought of a doctor who, having been colled in to consult with the family medical adviser, instead of consulting xvith his brother practitioner, concocted a long list of accusations of improper treatment of

the case without mentioning a, word to the doctor he came to consult with, and miliciously published them to the world ? “ It would seem that Mr. Bell has found it expedient to shift ills ground, and he how says all the objections he advanced were mere trifles compared with pumping. I think it must be apparent to every one who has carefully read ids letter, that he purposes either that the sewaga should be discharged into the bay, or that a scheme brought forward by the late Mr. Borlase should be adopted. That plan wts to force the sewage through the sewers by flushing from the higher parts of the city. At first Bight such a scheme possibly appeared feasible enough, but when the teat of a practical rule was applied it was found to be worthless, and was wisely abandoned. Before submitting my report of January last, a friend of mine brought Mr. Borlase's idea under my notice. I took some pains to test its nracticability, but was soon convinced that it could not bo made to answer, and resolved that if I could not devise a better design I would decline to give a report, being certain that to carry out such a system would only end in disappointment to those who found the money for the works, and would disgrace the engineer who recommended it,

“ With reference to the cost of pumping, I ask the committee's attention to this : A committee appointed last year by the President of the Government Board in England to inquire as to the best method of disposing of town sewage, gave much valuable information on this matter. It was stated, among other items, that the cost of pumping the sewage at Doncaster (population over 20,000), with a lift of 52 feet, was, including all expenses, £3OO per annum, or less than Id. per head per annum. I propose a lift of 24 feet only, at the same rate the cost of pumping would be less than half that, the expense being proportional to the height lifted ; but as fuel is dearer here, I will allow 4d., or even say 6d. a head. With a population of 50,000, the cost of pumping, at 6d. per head per annum, would be only £1250 a year. “ The committee will now be able to judge whether an expenditure of 4d. or 6d. a head per annum should be sufficient to deter them from carrying out a systuui of-sewerage which has given the greatest satisfaction as to efficiency and economy in all towns where it has been in use for many years, and I feel very confident that, if the scheme as propounded by me be carried out in a proper manner, Wellington will be no exception to the rule. “ Some months ago I ascertained that the cost of removing, by the present plan, but a small portion of what is usually considered to be sewage, was, about 10s. per head per year. From the Government report, which I have already alluded to, it is now understood that sewage includes all water polluted by ordinary purposes, all of whicii should be discharged by sewers, for it was pr ved by analysis that it is very little less injurious than- solid matter. Therefore the sewage which is now removed by hand labor and cartage is not even the onehundredth part of that which ought to be removed from and around dwellings, and which could all be discharged clear of the city by pumping at a cost of less than 6d. per bead per annum. From the foregoing, I think it may fairly be assumed that Mr. Bell is as little conversant with the cost of pumping as he has proved himself to be with pumps. “ It is quite true that when it was first proproposed to lift sewage ' from one level to another by artificial means there was a great hue and cry against it on account of expense. This lasted" until the late Mr. Robert Stephenson proved that pumping was in reality a very small item in the cost of an efficient system of sewerage, and was greatly more economical and reliable than the uncertain mode of flushing, which was advocated at that time, as now, by some who wish to be regarded as sanitary engineers. One great drawback to flushing is that the sewage is kept stagnant in the sewers fo'r a considerable time, whereas, by pumping, all offensive matter is removed at once, and it is well known that in motion there is safety, and in stagnation danger. “ Mr. Bell complains of there being no drawing of the tunnel. Such a complaint is founded on a misstatement. Ho was furnished with a plan of the route, a longitudinal section and cross-section, showing its form and size, with the sectional area calculated and figured on it.

“ He dwells strongly on the plans not being highly finished. I never intended that they should be highly finished, hut that they should merely deliueate the design. Would Mr. Bell have approved of the scheme if the plans had been gaily painted ? or would he have liked a water-color sketchof the tunnel asseenfrom one end of it ? If Mr. Bell had any experience in preparing plans to be criticised and judged by English Parliamentary committees, he would have known that coloring plans for such practical purposes is prohibited, and the reason is obvious. I should, indeed, he occupying a false position as an engineer, if the success of my design depended on the highly finishing of the plans. “ Surely Mr. Bell could not have received instructions to exhibit my plans about Christchurch as he says he has done, and I can only stigmatise such an act as a piece of gratuitous impertinence. In fact it is a most unprofessional proceeding, and is a proof of the danger of submitting plans to his custody. “I think it is unnecessary to trouble the committee with comments on any other part of Bell’s letter to the Mayor. “My drainage scheme has now been very fully discussed and criticised, both iu the reports and in letters to the papers, and I think it will be admitted that I have answered all objections of any weight which have been raised against it. Eleven months have passed since it was first submitted to the Council, and although I have had many opponents, I do not think they have succeeded in proving any errors in its conception or in the proposed details. For myself, I am more than ever confident that it will be the best cure for the present wretched sanitary condition of many parts of Wellington ; and with this advantage, that the benefits of this system of sewerage are* not limited to a certain time, but will be of equal importance to the city in the future as in the present.—l have, &c., “ Daniel Climib. “Wellington, December 19ch, 1877.”