138 



THE CIVIL ENGINEER AND ARCHITECT'S JOURNAL. 



[Mat, 



Westminster second-class sewer: IS feet brickwork, 



1 5s. ; 3 yards digging, 3s. ; — total .... 183. Od. 

 Holborn aod Finsbury second-class sewer: 9 feet brick- 

 work, 93. ; 2J yards digging, 2s. 4d. ;— total . . Us. 4d. 

 This shows a dirt'erence of Gs. 8d.,or between j(» and 60 per cent. 



A Holborn first-class sewer used to cost less than a Westminster first or 

 second class — being, in fact, 20 per cent, cheaper than the Westminster 

 second-class sewers. It is, therefore, scarcely conceivable that the mon- 

 strous waste of money involved in carrying out the Westminster mode of 

 construction should have been so long persevered in. 



The worst feature, however, in the present administration of the sewage 

 is, that it is virtually iuacessible to that class of houses which most require 

 drainage ; and it is no exaggeration to say, that the dwellings of the lower 

 classes in London are left without drainage. Very expensive and very- 

 well constructed main sewers and secondary sewers are laid down, but so 

 far from being applied to drain the dwellings, it is as much as they do to 

 drain the surface of the streets and roads. This arises from the commis- 

 sioners of sewers carrying their labours no further than the streets, leaving 

 the huussholders to make the communications with the sewers. 



We were going to say that the commissioners left the householders to 

 make the communications at their own expense with the main sewers, 

 but that would scarcely represent the true state of the case, for the 

 fact is, that the householders can only make a communication by ex- 

 posing themselves to heavy pains and penalties. The regulations of the 

 commissioners in most districts require as much expense to be incurred in 

 carrying a drain up to a house, as in laying a sewer in a small street, and 

 the result is that sewer drainage is a luxury unattainable by many of the 

 middle classes, and the majority of the mechanics and of the poorer 

 classes. 



A most expensive main sewer may run within a few yards of a house, 

 but the ou'lay required for running a drain into it is so large, is so dis- 

 proportioned to the necessity of the house, and so exorbitant in reference 

 to the means of the landlord and the extent of the rental, that the idea of 

 incurring such an expense is given up as hopeless. The consequence is 

 that numbers of bouses have cesspools, and in the closely crowded houses 

 in the small courts and alleys, it may be taken as the general rule that 

 there are no water closets, that fetid waters are kept on the premises, that 

 noxious miasma is as it were hoarded up, and all the appliances of fever are 

 held in readiness to tell with fatal etTect among a population, whose careless 

 and improvident habits readily predispose them to the attacks of infectious 

 disease. For such a state of alVairs, so fatal to the poorer classes and so 

 dangerous to the wealthier, the commissioners of sewers must be held ac- 

 countable ; and no remedy can be considered effectual until such a s)stem 

 is adopted, as will make it incumbent on the officers of sewers to provide 

 adequate drainage for every house, rich or poor, and give medical men 

 and officers of health the efficient means of removing evils which they 

 may deplore, but cannot prevent. 



We have already stated in the pages of the Journal that the charge of 

 the Westminster Commission of Sewers acted as prohibitory on fourth rate 

 houses within their jurisdiction, the charge being lOs. per foot. This 

 charge of 10s. per foot is made on the length of the froniage of the 

 house for permission to be allowed to enter one of the commissioners' 

 sewers, built at the expense of the public; and if it be a corner house, 

 the commissioners will not allow it to be drained at all into the sewer, 

 although there is a public one within 12 feet of the house, and will 

 compel the party to build a new sewer along the front of the house, and be 

 at the expense of an expensive connection with the old sewer. The whole 

 expense of forming this sewer and a drain for one fourth-rate house would 

 cost at the least \ol. to 20^, being 10 per cent, on the cost of the house, 

 which might be rlooe for about '21., if the commissioners would allow the 

 house to be draiued into the existing sewer. This is not a supposed ease, 

 but one which has actually occurred within the Westminister district, so 

 that parties considered it their duty to construct cesspools to avoid an ex- 

 cessive outlay. By requiring each house to have separate drains, at what- 

 ever distance the house maybe from the sewer, the charge of a heavy 

 drain is seriously aggravated, whereas in many cases one drain would be 

 sufficient for two or even for three houses. In fact, what is the difference 

 between allowing such a practice, and running an inferior sewer up a 

 small court into which many short drains are allowed to be made ? 



We wish some member of the House of Commons would move for a re- 

 turn of the length of all the sewers which have been built, rebuilt, or re- 

 paired at the expense of the public hy the commission, their cost, and the 

 actual number of houses ou each side of the sewer which draiu into it, and 



the number which do not, distinguishing courts ; if we are not very much 

 mistaken, this return alone would upset the present commission, and would 

 show that these commissions do their utmost to obstruct the drainage of 

 the metropolis, and consequently to injure the health of the inhabitants. 

 M'hat we contend for is, that if the commissioners are obliged to construct 

 a sewer for public purposes, that all the houses ou each side should be 

 allowed to enter it, for, generally speaking, where the commissioners do 

 build a sewer, it is through au old district which has been paying sewer 

 rates for many years: for instance, a sewer has been built in High-street, 

 St. Giles's, by the commissioners, and although the houses on each side 

 have been paying rates these 50 or 60 years past, they are not allowed to 

 drain into it, without paying a fine of ten shillings per foot frontage. 



If the management of the sewage in the metropolis present such a state 

 of allairs, what can be said of the paving boards? It is bad enough to 

 have half-a-dozen commissions of sewers, each of which embraces a large 

 borough or many parishes; but the paving boards in many cases have not 

 even the jurisdiction of a parish or a borough, but some parishes are split 

 up among a score paving boards, each separate estate having its own par- 

 ing and lighting boards, its own set of commissioners, and its own set of 

 officers to take charge of the paving, lighting and cleansing of a narrow 

 confined district. The nuisance prevails to such an extent, and the want 

 of organization is so strongly felt, that it is most extraordinary that it 

 should have been submitted to so long. If Lord Morpelh should let the 

 commissions of sewers alone — though we do not see why he should — there 

 ought at any rate to be a consolidation of the paving boards, either into a 

 central board or borough boards. At present, the City of London is the 

 only district having a consolidated board, which is also that of the commis- 

 sioners of sewers, and nothing has occurred in the working of that board 

 to show its inferiority to the labours of the score or more boards, who mis- 

 manage the affairs of districts not greater in superficies, nor of more im- 

 portance in extent of traffic. 



It is stated, that besides the City of London Commission and the Regent- 

 street Commission, there are no less than 84 different boards having the 

 management of the paving in the metropolis. In the parish of St. Pancras 

 alone there are no less than 16 different boards. In Kensington there are 

 ten boards, in Lambeth there are seven boards, in Newington Butts six, in 

 Whitechapel six, in Bermondsey five, in St. George's, Southwark, four, 

 in St. Andrew's, Holborn, four, and in Shoreditch, four. 



Some boards have only the management of the highways, some only of 

 the lighting. 



Altogether there is such a confusion that the commissioners themselves 

 in some cases scarcely know what they are about. 



Of course, each of these boards has it own commissioner, its own clerk, 

 its own surveyor, and its own rates, and it is easy to determine what must 

 be the consequences, — that while the ratepayers are overcharged for such an 

 establishment, the officers are inadequately remunerated. Instead of 

 liberal salaries being given to parties of competent abilities, miserable 

 stipends are allotted to those who now discharge the offices, while the 

 public are not thereby benefited. 



That it is requisite to have eighty-six clerks to boards and their subordi- 

 nates, we cannot conceive that anyone will take ihe trouble to affirm; 

 while their reduction would leave a well-paid staff, and effect a large 

 saving. 



The surveyors and assistants attached to eighty-six boards would, no 

 doubt, be reduced in number, though perhaps not to such an extent as the 

 clerks, while the re-appointments would secure a large and efficient body 

 of officials, wilh a graduated scale of liberal salaries ; giving a stimulus to 

 merit, and holding out an adequate reward for long services. 



M'e are sure that the surveyors of the City of London, of the Woods and 

 Forests, and of St. Maryleboue, are not worse piid than the surveyors of 

 such petty districts as Ely Place, the Saffron Hill Liberty, Tothill Fields, 

 the Brewer's Estate, the Lucas Estate, or the Harrison Estate. 



Under the present state of afl'airs, it frequently happens that the com- 

 missioners of sewers or of paving are restricted in their powers of useful 

 action, or imagine themselves to be so, aad as the cost of amending a local 

 act for a small district is considerable, they are often virtually debarred 

 from the official discharge of their duties. This is one of the many cir- 

 cumstances consequent on their small and limited jurisdictions. Some of 

 the commissioners of sewers consider that they are not empowered to do 

 anything else but to repair old sewers, — all concur that they have no 

 effective powers to make drains to houses, or to take necessary measures 

 for the preservation of the public health. 



There is nothing in the management of these paving boards, nhich can 



