BUILDINGS
(7) Continuation,
The Chinese village at Wongneichong persisted until 1923, when a typhoon brought excessively heavy rainfall and floods, many of the old dwellings collapsing. Within the past ten years rapid changes have been seen, and Happy Valley apart from the many European dwellings on its now healthy slopes shelters a small town of Flats and tenements where picturesque Wongneichong village once stood.
BUILDINGS (8).
In yesterday's article I dealt with the story of the Cochrane Street Collapse and the two inquiries which followed. On Wednesday September 25, the Magistrate Br. Hazeland, said that in his opinion, the following conditions and circumstances contributed to the collapse:-
(1) The existence of a Blacksmith's shop on the ground floor of No. 32 Cochrane Street. It was proved in evidence that vibration has a tendency to weaken the walls of a house.
(2) On the ground floor of No. 34 Cochrane Street, was a cockloft used by the tenant, who was a contractor for storing beams and planks.
(3) The defective construction of the party wall between No. 32 and 34 Cochrane Street. It was proved in evidence that the said party wall was badly bonded, and that the heart of the said wall was hollow and filled in with small pieces of bricks.
(4) The existence of an extra storey which was put on each of the said houses, six or seven months prior to the collapse.
(5) That the weather prior to the collapse, hot one hour and then a heavy shower, would have caused considerable contraction and expansion of the material, and acting on the old walls, would have considerably tended to the collapse.
(6) That there was a deviation from approved plans while altering the two houses, the principal deviation being the building of an arch instead of a wall and the total absence of internal cross walls.
Putting myself in the position of a Coroner's jury I make the following suggestions as riders:-
(a) That the existence of Blacksmith's shops under tenement building should be prohibited.
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