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LOADING AND TRANSPORT OF REFUSE BY LIGHTERS
BYE-LAWS FOR THE PREVENTION OF NUISANCE ARISING FROM
REFUSE IN OR UPON ANY SHIP, BOAT OR VESSEL
The Port of London Health Authority's bye-laws are designed to control —
(a) The prevention of nuisances arising from dust, ashes, rubbish, carrion, fish or filth or
other matter or thing in or upon any ship, boat or vessel within the district of the Port
Health Authority and
(b) the removal of offensive matter or liquid.
There are twenty one refuse wharves situated within the River districts, eighteen of these
are in regular use or capable of being used if required for the loading of refuse lighters. The
refuse is discharged at the three land reclamation centres of Hornchurch, Rainham & Pitsea.
The importance of this branch of London's refuse disposal service will be appreciated when
it is realised that this year nearly three quarters of a million tons of refuse was disposed of
through the wharves.
The enforcement of the Bye-laws is carried out by the Port Health Inspectors stationed on
the River districts where, in addition to regular observations of the refuse wharves and lighters
being made from the Port Health Cutters, shore inspections are made at short intervals thus keeping
contact with all the personnel engaged in loading the lighters and with the problems they meet.
The Inspectors report that apart from broken sheet lashings and displaced or torn tarpaulinsworking
mishaps caused by wind and weather —no serious infringements of the Bye-laws by the
loaded lighters on passage down river to the discharging wharves had been met with during the
year.
The wharves, however, still leave much to be desired, the Authority still being far from
satisfied with the arrangements in operation at some of the wharves where the loading facilities
are antiquated and insanitary and because of their location and structure are, without extensive
reconstruction and modernisation,unable to be improved. Finance of course plays a large part in
often delaying necessary modifications and modernisation.
Progress has been made at some of the wharves. There has been a definite trend away from
the direct tipping of refuse from road vehicles into the lighters towards the indirect method
whereby the refuse is first tipped into a collection pit or walled area and then loaded into the
lighters by grabs, thus the refuse lorries are not delayed and the lighters can be loaded at any
state of the tide without creation of air borne dust and spillage overside.
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