Report to the General Board of Health on a preliminary inquiry into the sewerage, drainage, and supply of water, and the sanitary condition of the inhabitants of the town of Aylesbury / by William Ranger, Superintending Inspector.

William Ranger

Date:: 1849

Credit: Report to the General Board of Health on a preliminary inquiry into the sewerage, drainage, and supply of water, and the sanitary condition of the inhabitants of the town of Aylesbury / by William Ranger, Superintending Inspector. Source: Wellcome Collection.

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$in which case the owner being the only available person must stand in the place of the occupier, and he must pay the improve- ment rate and collect it back from his fluctuating tenantry. In the several parts of the town where there are no privies, as well as in other parts where there is an insufficiency of privy accommodation, it will be necessary to erect proper privies. If they are erected by the owners the expense will be excessively heavy, and the immediate outlay will often form an insuperable obstacle to the provision, the ordinary expense being from 5Z. to 8/. for the construction of a new privy. Now it has been suggested, that if they were made of hollow brick, and constructed in numbers, the expense as estimated would be about 40s. each, and with the soil-pan costing 10^'., they might probably be well fitted up complete for 3Z. In such cases instead of calling upon the owners for the immediate outlay of 3/., three or four shillings per annum may be placed as it were on assessment upon the particular tenement as an improvement rate for the 20 years, and collected with the Poor-rate or some other consolidated rate. The cost, in the absence of the requisite engineering details necessary for estimates in the aggregate for future plans for the charges per house must be deduced from works of a similar character executed in other places and from the experience of general estimates. The basis upon which it is desirable to establish future plans is that of a constant supply o(pure— luholesome—and proper water, public and private drainage of areas, houses, and roads; distribution of liquid manure so as to render it productive—a manure which, from its superior quality, it may fairly be antici- pated vvill be eagerly sought throughout the district for which it may be applicable, and rendered a source of profit alike to the farmer and the inhabitants when means of applying it are pro- vided ; improving the ventilation of courts, alleys, and yards as well as back and front houses; daily cleansing of roads and pave- ment. The pi^esent expenditure of the town taken as near as can be conjectured, which it is proposed to divert for works, consist of— 1st. Cost of emptying privy pits and cesspools. Assuming that one-third of the houses are furnished each with its own privy, and that the annual cost of emptying is \Qs. per house; that one-third of the remaining two-thirds of the houses have one privy pit in common to every two houses, but subject to the same annual charge of 10s. per pit; and the remaining one-third as making use of tubs, allowing one tub to every three houses, and the cost of emptying in money or time 1*. per tub per month as the average in each case; and for the present water supply, assuming that one-third of the houses are furnished with a private well and pump, taking the cost of repairs, &c., at the annual rate of 15s. [3.]$