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47
Considerable stress is laid on the shortness of the term of
forty years to which the Commission have limited their forecast.
The capacity of the Thames and Lea watersheds as sources of
supply may be expected to have reached, or nearly reached, their
limit about the year 1931, and then it will be impossible any
further to delay turning to some outside source. By that time,
however, the best gathering grounds in the country, which " are
already being rapidly taken possession of by other municipalities,"
may be lost to us. In regard to this, one has to bear in mind
the long time which is required for the execution of the vast
works necessary in large water schemes, and Mr. Binnie, the
Council's chief engineer, says plainly that the people of London,
" will, at some not very distant date (probably twenty years
hence) have to contemplate the exhaustion of the supplies which
can be obtained in the Thames Valley," and the necessity of
looking elsewhere for an increased supply.
" One of the greatest blots upon the finding of the Royal
Commission" is that " it can in no way be considered a final
settlement of the case." This limitation of forecast to forty years
is all the more curious in view of the fact that two members of
the Royal Commission, giving evidence before the House of
Lords on the Birmingham water scheme, gave much longer
periods as the time for which estimates should be made,
Mr. G. H. Hill stating that provision for a large town should be
for a period of not less than 50 years, and Mr. James Mansergh,
the engineer to the scheme, indicating that he calculated his supply
for some sixty-four years, and on that basis laid out the works
which the Corporation of Birmingham are now carrying out.
The Effect of Dry Seasons.
Mr. Binnie shows in a striking way the difference between
averages and actualities in regard to the flow of water down a
river bed. The Royal Commissioners contemplating taking 300
million gallons from the Thames daily, trusting to the fact that
the average daily flow at Teddington weir is about 1,350 million