25
If we wish to encourage and promote clean habits and a more sanitary mode of living among the working and coolie class of Chinese residents in the Colony, let us, before condemning them for their dirty habits, give them the means of becom- ing clean and improving their objectionable mode of living, &c., &c.
15. The floors of all the ground floor rooms, would be of concrete, and the walls (external and internal) rendered for a height of 18 inches in neat cement.
16. The only underground drain in the Block, would be the one leading from the large gully, in the centre of the open yard. It would be laid in a straight line to the 20-feet private street, passing under the floor of the latrine, it would be of 6 inches diameter glazed earthenware socket pipes, pointed in cement, and bedded in concrete, having man-holes at each end for inspection and cleaning purposes.
17. Water would be laid into each cook-house and ablution-room, and a sinall stand-pipe, in the open yard for general purposes, which stand-pipe would also be used by the tenants generally (having a large enclosed open yard) for washing their clothes, &c., which would be done in the usual Chinese manner, a little soap and small wooden tub. If no provision of this kind is made, they have no alter- native but to resort to the side-walks of the public streets as is now the case.
18. The living rooms vary somewhat in size, they are so designed, however, that they could be easily let out to friends, clansmen, or married families, who may wish to live together.
19. Such a Block, as the one referred to on Drawing No. 2, Block A on Inland Lot No. 954, would accommodate 371 adults, allowing each adult 300 cubic feet and 21 superficial feet. The estimated cost of such a building (exclusive of the cost of the ground) is about $8,500.00 or, say, at the rate of $23.50 per adult.
20. Twenty-seven (27) Blocks of houses as described, can be erected on the three plots of ground referred to, viz.:-
Inland Lot No. 953,
22
**
954, 906,
Total,......
No. of Blocks. No. of Adults.
11
3,635
6
2,226
10
3,510
27
9,371
651
or at the rate of 2,136 adults per acre. The net actual building area of the three plots of ground is 419 acres.
21. I should like here to caution the Committee against being lead away by ⚫ misstatements as to what is overcrowding. A letter by a well known Medical Gentleman (Dr. CANTLIE) appeared in the local papers a few days ago, in which he said: In Britain 1,000 persons to an acre is the sanitary limit,* any number over that constitutes surface overcrowding as distinct from overcrowding," this statement is very vague and likely to do harm, and, in my opinion, no importance whatsoever should be attached to it, unless the writer of the letter gives us his au- thority for the statement, and how his figures were arrived at. Was the acre area mentioned the net actual area covered by buildings, or did it include streets, gar- dens, yards, parks, cominons, &c., extending over many acres? The before men- tioned number of people that can be accommodated in the suggested new buildings, and allowing each individual 300 cubic feet, and also in a 3 storied building only, is at the rate of 2,136 adults per acre, and I am sure that the learned Doctor him- self would, or could not, by any possible means call it "overcrowding."
* Query.-W.J.S.
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