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water. The four storm water pumping stations are Lots Road,
Heathwall, Falcon Brook and Shad Thames. These works cost
approximately £4,000,000 and between 1856 and 1914 about £ 12,500,000
had been expended on London's main drainage system.
It had been realised by the Council for some time before the first
World War that the provision for carrying away and dealing with
storm water had not kept pace with requirements. The increased
density of development and the introduction of tar-paved road surfaces
had great'iy increased not only the amount of surface water, but also
the rate at which it reached the sewers. In 1919, therefore, schemes for
further flood relief were investigated and the construction of several
undertaken. Many of these were considerably larger than previous
ones. The North Western Relief, for instance, is five miles long and
at its largest is 9 feet 6 inches in diameter whilst the North Eastern is
4½ miles long and at its outlet 11 feet 4 inches in diameter. At the
same time considerable increase in pumping power was provided at
existing pi mping stations by installing modern pumping plant in place
of that v ich had been working, in some cases, since 1864/65.
Notably were the eight electrically driven pumps at Abbey Mills
Pumping Station with a total capacity of 224,000 gallons per minute
in place of the old Beam engines.
In this period between the wars, two new storm water pumping
stations were built; the Hammersmith and the Earl, the latter which
was only commissioned since the end of the war and as yet has only
two pumping sets installed out of the six for which the station is
designed.
Some ten square miles of London adjacent to the River Thames
are below Trinity High Water Mark or below average high tide level
in the river, whilst the area below maximum abnormal tides is about
twenty-two square miles. All drainage both dry weather and storm
flow from these areas has to be pumped.
Before turning to a brief history and description of the Outfall
Works, it might be mentioned here that the Council takes the dry
weather flow from a number of out county Boroughs. The admission
of sewage from these Boroughs is governed by Acts of Parliament and
the principal condition usually enforced is that the flow shall not
exceed fifty gallons per head per day.
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