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SECTION IV
INLAND BARGE TRAFFIC
Numbers and tonnage using the district and places served by the traffic.
These barges are of all types and are registered annually with the Port of London Authority.
They number approximately 7,000 and their tonnage is some 500,000.
The traffic of these craft extends throughout the length of the Port while a number of them
are employed carrying goods and merchandise via the canals to all parts of the country.
SECTION V
WATER SUPPLY
1. Source of supply for:—
(a) The District — No change.
(b) Shipping — No change.
2. Reports of tests for contamination: —
It is very desirable that samples at normal temperature be delivered at the laboratory as
early as possible and not later than six hours after they have been drawn.
Previously, samples had been taken to the Central Public Health Laboratory at Colindale or
to Devonport Pathological Laboratory at Greenwich, according to the prevailing circumstances,
while the Public Health Laboratory at Maidstone had examined samples from the Medway. However
by courtesy of the North East Metropolitan Hospital Board, arrangements were made for bacteriological
tests of water samples from supplies within the Port to be undertaken by the laboratory
at St. Andrew's Hospital Bow. Accordingly samples drawn from the supplies in Docks on the
north bank of the River were sent to Bow, while those from the south bank supplies and vessels
moored in the River were sent to Greenwich.
The first test of the new arrangements arose soon afterwards when routine samples drawn
from hydrants in Millwall Dock and despatched to Bow were found to be grossly polluted with
faecal organisms. In order to trace the source of pollution, many samples were taken at intervals
while processes of elimination continued. Eventually, this gross contamination was traced to a
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