[Report 1878] / Medical Officer of Health, Craven (Combined) Sanitary Districts.

  • Craven Combined Sanitary Districts.
Date:
1878
Catalogue details

Licence: Attribution-NonCommercial 4.0 International (CC BY-NC 4.0)

Credit: [Report 1878] / Medical Officer of Health, Craven (Combined) Sanitary Districts. Source: Wellcome Collection.

    13/94 (page 5)
    The accompanying Table B shews approximately the extent of area (in acres) in each district drained by the several rivers. Table B. UlSTKICT. Lune. Ribble. Aire. Wharfe. Total. Settle Bubal 59,557 52,056 7,569 22,327 62,185 7,988 4,245 6,963 15,124 360 4,087 18,002 78,119 151.942 147.943 7,988 4,245 6,963 15,124 360 4,087 Sktptok B.ttrat. Keighley Rural Skipton Urban SiLsuEN Urban Oakworth Urban Haworth Urban OxENHOPE Urban Totals 59,557 59,625 123,279 96,191 338,652 House Accommodation.—The house accommodation seems generally adequate for the population—only a few cases of over-crowding having been noticed. The houses are, with few exceptions, well-built of stone ; in many instances, however, the subsoil is very imperfectly drained, and dampness is the result. The ventilation, also, is frequently defective, as in many of the houses the bedroom windows either do not open at all, or only open by means of casements of small size. These two defects, I have no doubt, account in a large measure for the great proportion of deaths and disease, from phthisis and allied complaints. Many houses are unfurnished with back doors, and a good many are built back to back. The house drainage is almost universally defective, the slojj-stone pipes and other house wastes being directly connected with the drains, frequently without any trap what- ever, or else with only the common bell-trap. The soil pipes of water-closets are also rarely ventilated, and even when they are, only an inch pipe as a rule is used. It cannot be too strongly insisted upon, that one of the most important objects to be aimed at in house drainage, is the prevention of all escapes of sewer gases into the house. The best method of attaining this object, in the case of all house wastes, such as the w'aste pipes from baths, sinks, and lavatories, and the overflow pipes from any cisterns, and from any safe undei’ any bath or water-closet, in fact, every pipe for carrying off waste water, is to take it through an external wall, and make it discharge in the ojoen air, over a trapped gully grating. The same principle should also be carried out in the case of water-closets, though the method is different. In this, the simplest plan is to continue the soil pipe in its full diameter, up to the roof, leaving it open to the air; another opening should bo made at its lower end. By means of a water-trap placed at the sewer side of the lower opening, a current of air will be created through the soil pi2:>es. For the further guidance of persons intending to alter their house drainage, I propose shortly, to have sketches and models of approved forms dej^osited at the offices of the various Authorities. Excrement Disposal.—With the excejhioii of Skipton, which is well supplied with water-closets, the method of excrement disposal throughout the district, is either by means