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to the sludge settling channels at the outfall are being carried out by direct employment
of labour at an estimated cost of £1,900. The total expenditure involved
will, it is estimated, amount to £23,000.
An accumulation of sand and other material in the lower sludge store at the
outfall, which was of many years' standing, had become so consolidated that it was
necessary to employ manual labour to break it up. The cost of this work, including
the removal of the material, has been £820. The work of repairing and strengthening
the main chimney at the outfall was carried out at a cost of £689 10s.
Several of the piles and rubbing pieces of the pier at the outfall had become
defective and repairs were also necessary to the upper and lower dolphins. The
repairs were carried out by labour directly employed at a total cost of £720.
The return wall at the eastern end of the wharf wall at the outfall was repaired
at a cost of £240.
The store keeping and issuing arrangements at the outfall have been re-organised
and simplified. Expenditure amounting to £126 has been incurred for bins, etc.
Abbey Mills
pumping
station.
The condition of the seven boilers in the west boiler-house at Abbey Mills
pumping station, which had been working for nearly 35 years, was such that consideration
had to be given to the question of their renewal or alternatively to the
provision of some form of motive power other than steam. The boilers in question
supply steam for driving the beam engines and pumps in the main engine-house.
In addition to the main engine-house, which was constructed in the year 1869, there
are two other engine-houses. The second engine-house was built in the year 1894
to deal principally with sewage and storm water from the Isle of Dogs, and it has
recently been re-organised. The third engine-house was erected in the year 1912, for
the purpose of pumping storm water, and contains seven gas-driven engines and
pumps. The total pumping capacity of the station is about 1,300 tons a minute.
The area served by the station is 34 square miles in extent on the north side
of the river and includes all the low-lying lands on this side. Sewage brought by
the low level sewers is pumped continuously, and at times of rainfall large quantities
of storm water flow to the station. Except at low tide, the low-lying parts of
the City of London, Westminster, Stepney, Hackney and part of Poplar are
entirely dependent upon Abbey-mills pumping station for the prevention of flooding.
Even at low tide the relief given by the storm overflows from these areas can only
be relatively small, and from time to time complaints are received of flooding
in these areas during heavy rainfall.
In recent years the rate of discharge of storm water into the sewers has been
greatly increased by the waterproofing of road surfaces. It has therefore been
considered advisable to increase the pumping capacity here by the installation of
modern machinery in the main engine-house. The present building is spacious and
would lend itself to a gradual replacement of the machinery without much interference
with the working of the station, a matter of considerable moment. Each
of the four bays of the building could accommodate, in place of the two beam
pumping sets at present installed, two centifrugal pumping sets with a pumping
capacity more than three times as great. Such a scheme would increase the total
pumping capacity of the whole station by about 60 per cent., namely, from 1,300
tons to 2,100 tons a minute approximately. After careful consideration the
Council decided to adopt electricity as the motive power for the new plant and
approved an estimate of £141,000 for the reorganisation of the main enginehouse
on the lines indicated above. The tender submitted by W. H. Allen, Sons and
Company, Limited, Bedford, for the supply and erection of four pumping sets for
£36,917 and for an option exercisable by the Council to purchase four additional
sets at a price not exceeding £23,985, was accepted on 13th December, 1928.
The embankment, known as the Long Wall, fronting on the Channelsea river
forms the flood prevention bank to a considerable area of land, including the site