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Thursday, June 24, 2021

Spirit of Place: Our Welsh Water

 Surely it must be common knowledge that Birmingham has its water brought here from Wales?

Every day 320 million litres of water travels 73 miles (117 km) from Wales to Birmingham to fill kettles, baths and boilers. But why does it come so far?

It dates back to the Victorian era when Birmingham was a rapidly growing city plagued by illnesses like cholera and typhoid which were caused by contaminated water.

A search for clean water sparked an "amazing feat of ingenuity" to bring it from the Welsh hills to the city.

 During the industrial revolution Birmingham's population soared and the city's wells and rivers, the Rea and Tame, become contaminated by sewage.

In 1873 Joseph Chamberlain became mayor which went on to cause a hostile takeover of the city's waterworks, creating the Birmingham Corporation Water Department.

His surveyors went out in search of clean water and decided the best place to get it from was Elan Valley in Wales.

 It had an average annual rainfall of 1830mm and its landscape was higher than Birmingham's, which would enable the 55 million litres of water to be transported to the city entirely by gravity.

Sarah-Jayne O'Kane, from Severn Trent Water, said the ambitious plan was to create a series of lakes by damming Elan and Claerwen rivers and transporting water via an aqueduct.

'No say'

The Birmingham Corporation Water Department achieved an Act of Parliament in 1892 enabling the compulsory purchase of the Elan Valley.

"The people of the village had no say," said Glyn Webster at Elan Valley Visitors Centre.

"About 100 people had to move out and around 20 buildings were destroyed.

"Most of the villagers were tenant farmers and only the land owners were given a small amount of compensation." Source


Actually what made me post this was reading today about a new government initiative. They want us all (or perhaps it's just schools) singing - the article I read compared this to North Korea. It also commented that Wales just isn't doing it. In fact nobody is doing it except a couple of schools in Bradford. What is wrong with them? Tomorrow is OBON day but the education secretary is having the piss taken out of him over it. Here is the song:



2 comments:

  1. The Welsh should have started a riot over that water stealing!

    *cringe* Listening to a song sang by school children brings back the memories of the awkwardness of it all. You've got those few kids that are over eager practically ready to scream the song and the rest of us just trying to get through and be done with it. I was once sent to the principal's office because my third grade teacher realized that when we said the pledge of allegiance every morning I wouldn't say the last line, "One nation under God." When she asked me why I said it wasn't original to the pledge and only added in 1953, so I didn't feel like I should have to say it. She accused me of being a smart ass and sent me to the principal.

    The principal was exasperated and said, "What does it matter if it was added in 1953 or not?" I said "It was added by the Knights of Columbus and they go fuck themselves." So then I was in trouble for reals and got suspended from school for a day or two. My mom yelled at my Grandpa because she thought it was his fault, he was a Free Mason, but I read about it in a library book.

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    Replies
    1. Which just about sums up everything that is wrong with our world, when a girl gets in trouble for educating herself and making up her own mind.

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