Annual report on Nyasaland / Colonial Office.

  • Colonial Office
Date:
[1946]
Catalogue details

Licence: Public Domain Mark

Credit: Annual report on Nyasaland / Colonial Office. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    50/68 page 46
    Blantyre draws its water from a dam on the Mudi River some four miles from the town. The water is passed through sedimentation tanks and pressure filters before being chlorinated and piped by gravity through a six-inch main to the township. The electrical power plant consists of three diesel driven alternators with a total output of 255 kilowatts. Both services are owned and operated by the Municipality; the charge for water is 2s. 6d. a thousand gallons up to an amount which depends on the rateable value of the property and is. a thousand gallons thereafter. Electricity charges differ according to different uses; for ordinary house¬ holds there is a minimum monthly charge equal to three units per living- room at is. 8d. a unit, and thereafter 2d. a unit for the next fifty units and id. a unit for any excess. Limbe does not have a piped water supply, but a scheme is under preparation for a gravity supply depending on a service reservoir into which water will be pumped from a dam. Electricity is bought in bulk from the Nyasaland Railways by the Municipality, which distributes it throughout the township. For ordinary households there is a minimum monthly charge of 5s.y charges being levied on a basis of is. per unit up to an amount equal to is. per hundred square feet of the main buildings, and thereafter 3d. a unit. Lilongwe has no electricity supply, and the present water supply merely delivers river water to the houses unfiltered and unchlorinated. Water is pumped from the river to a small service reservoir, and thence fed by gravity throughout the township. Plans have been prepared for augmenting this supply and for introducing filtering and chlorination. The undertaking is controlled by a Water Board and serviced by the Public Works Department; the charge is 2s. 3d. a thousand gallons. Chapter XI: Communications SHIPPING SAILINGS to and from African ports continued to be irregular through¬ out the year. Internal water transport on Lake Nyasa is mainly in the hands of the Nyasaland Railways, who in July suffered the loss, referred to in Part I, of their new T.S.M.V. Vipya, a replacement for which is now on order. At present they have only one ship, the Mpasa, of 200 tons, but four tugs and a number of barges have been ordered and are expected to be put into service during 1947. The Universities’ Mission to Central Africa and a private owner also operate small steamers on the Lake. RAILWAYS Communication with the sea at Beira and with Southern Rhodesia and South Africa is effected by the 3 ft. 6 in. line operated by the Nyasa¬ land Railways, the Central Africa Railways, and the Trans-Zambesia Railway, via the Lower Zambesi Bridge, whose 12,064 feet make it the longest railway bridge in the world. Railhead is at Salima, on Lake Nyasa, and at Chipoka, further south on the Lake, trains connect with the lake
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