Plan Now Adopted.

I have not seen the complete plans for Harbour improvement, of which the present training wall is an instalment; but from isolated Reports and the work itself I gather that the scheme is simply the cutting of a channel from Burke's to Dunedin, to be protected on each side by a timber training wall, over which the dredged material will be thrown. The advantages of this plan are, the protection it affords to the banks of the new channel, and the facilities it presents for disposing of dredged materials. I think, however, that these are more than balanced by the following objections :—

1st. The position and design of the training wall is diametrically opposed to the idea of creating a shore current to remove and disseminate sewerage matter.

2nd. No advantage is taken of the tide to scour the channel; on the contrary, the tidal current is effectually excluded. It will therefore become a receptacle for sewerage and other sediment, which must be removed by dredging.

3rd. The dredgings deposited on the outside of the training walls will be earned by the waves and currents to tidal banks, there to accumulate and augment the evils of reclamation. In proof of this assertion, I find the Harbour Master reporting that the channel at Rattray Street had shoaled nearly two feet from April, 1871, to April, 1872. Now, as this could not possibly be alluvial deposit, we must conclude that it was dredgings carried there by the action of the sea.

I think that the above objections alone are fatal to the present scheme of Harbour improvement; and, except it possesses some other great advantage of which I am not aware, I would not be inclined to recommend its adoption.