THE SEWERAGE OF KANSAS CITY, • 97 



water. The use of them for carrying domestic waste is comj_,aratively recent and 

 the carrying of storm-water and household waste together, is known as the com- 

 bined system. 



The separate system of sewerage leaves the storm-water sewers to do the 

 work for which they were originally intended, and provides separate sewers for 

 household waste. These are very much smaller than those used in the combined 

 system, and are provided with means of cleansing, periodically, by flushing with 

 water. Mr. Moore argues that as storm-water sewers must be built, it is unneces- 

 sary to duplicate them with smaller sewers, that the history of sewerage does not 

 bear out the claims of superior sanitary conditions in the separate system, and 

 that instead of being an economy it would result in a final expense greater than 

 that of the combined system. Cites the example of Croydon, England, the 

 health of Memphis, and gives a distance of i,ooo feet as the limit that may be 

 allowed for water to run in surface-gutters before being carried below the surface ; 

 these will be taken up later. In a subsequent paper he makes a proportion of 

 one mile of storm-water sewers to two miles of the separate system, but it is not 

 entirely clear whether it is to be taken as meaning that one mile of storm-water 

 sewer would be required for a district containing two miles of other sewers or 

 whether they should be counted as three miles, each doing its share of the whole. 



In Mr. Moore's citation of Croydon he states that six-inch and four-inch 

 sewers were replaced with larger sizes, and the ventilation improved, greatly im- 

 proving the sanitary condition of the city, and infers that the improvements since 

 made in ventilation, and flushing by means of automatic flush-tanks, are not of 

 so great importance as to constitute a valid claim to its being a new system. He 

 also considers that Mr. Chanute's claim that the sanitary condition of Memphis 

 is greatly improved by the system of sewerage adopted, is not well founded. 



As to the first, so many cities, both here and in Europe, are adopting the 

 distinctive system known as the Waring separate system, that it would seem that 

 the many engineers who have these works in hand could hardly be mistaken in 

 ascribing the credit of it to Mr. Waring, and especially when the city of Paris, 

 after a year's study by the best scientists and engineers of France, deliberately 

 adopted the system, called him to make the initial experiment, and have since 

 called on him for plans for some seventy miles of additional sewers. If a con- 

 gress of European engineers, after mature study, unite in giving Mr. Waring credit 

 for great and valuable improvements, it would seem that his countrymen might 

 also afford to give him what credit may justly be his due — for so far as the bugbear 

 of his patents and royalties are concerned, they do not amount to a tithe of the 

 economy which can be attained by their use. And in a country whose mechan- 

 ical and engineering achievements have been largely due to the character of our 

 patent laws, these ought not to be a barrier to taking up anything that promises 

 economy and improvement. 



With regard to the sanitary condition of Memphis, the writer spent a year or 

 more there, leaving just as the yellow fever broke out, has visited the city several 



VIII-7 



