Swansea's Main Drainage Scheme
| By 1907 the
population of Swansea was increasing rapidly past 100,000. The majority of these people
were contributing to the pollution of the River Tawe either at work or at home. The filth
of the river was also beginning to be apparent on the sands of Swansea Bay, which by this
time was hugely popular as a focus for holidays for the masses of industrial workers of
the South Wales valleys. In the hot summer weather (and Swansea had a run of hot summers
in the early 1900s), the river turned into a foul stagnant liability with only sporadic
relief from the flushing effect of the tide.
Both borough and various consulting engineers agreed that the only suitable scheme was for an outfall that took sewage a long way away from the river mouth. Ideally this would entail releasing effluent into the bay at a point where the general currents of the Bristol Channel would apparently disperse it away from the inner reaches of the bay. This was a popular view across the country. Many other municipal authorities viewed carefully placed sea outfalls as a cost effective solution to sewage pollution. The phrase 'out of sight, out of mind' characterises early sanitation perfectly. The Swansea scheme was no different in this respect than others at towns such as Blackpool, New Brighton and Whitby. |
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| Right: A Dick
German cartoon from a 1907 edition of The South Wales Daily Post. The original caption: 'It is reported that dissatisfaction exists over the site selected for the new pilotage house, inasmuch as a powerful aroma usually pervades the atmosphere at the spot. The window was open, the curtain was drawn, a microbe flew in and a pilot had gone'
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