50 T. H. HOUGHTON. 



behalf of the municipal councils; up to the end of the last 

 financial year £338,314 had been spent on this work; this 

 includes Parramatta, which cost £66,010, and has since 

 been transferred to the Metropolitan Board, but does not 

 include Sydney and Newcastle. 



All these works have been carried out since 1901, besides 

 the fifteen country towns which already have sewerage 

 works. Progress has been made towards the completion 

 of the schemes in Orange, Goulburn, and Albury. 



The City of Sydney in 1891 had a complete sewerage 

 works in operation, except in the low lying areas, but out- 

 side the city and the nearer suburbs very little had been 

 done with the reticulation, but the main sewers were in 

 progress. The number of properties liable for sewerage rates 

 at the end of that year were 31,807. By the end of June 

 1916, this number had increased to 129,650 houses, serving 

 an estimated population of 650,000. Naturally from this 

 great increase it follows that the length of main sewers 

 and reticulation has also increased; in 1891 the total length 

 of sewers under the Board's jurisdiction was 149 miles, and 

 at the end of June 1916 the length had become 1,022 miles, 

 a much greater rate of increase than that of the population 

 served. 



Until 1916, the sewage from the south side of the har- 

 bour was discharged, either into the ocean at Bondi, or 

 after treatment, at the Sewage Farm at Botany, which had 

 an area of 620 acres, into Botany Bay. For some years 

 previously, complaints had been made as to the nuisance 

 arising from this farm, and in 1907 a scheme for an ocean 

 outfall in substitution for the sewage farm, was submitted 

 to Parliament and approved. After exhaustive observations 

 of the coastal currents, the most favourable point for the 

 sewer outlet was found to be on the northern headland of 

 Long Bay, as the southerly current at that point would 

 sweep the sewage to sea clear of the land to the south. 



