Port Lincoln Times (SA : 1927 - 1986; 1992 - 2002), Friday 7 February 1930, page 10


TOD RIVER RESERVOIR, A TRIUMPH OF ENGINEERING.

The construction of Tod River Reservoir has strengthened the claim of South Australia that it has the largest water distributing scheme ot its kind in the world. Its 24 impounding reservoirs can hold 16,796,906,000 gallons, and serve an area of 720,000 square miles. The capital cost of waterworks exceeds £11,000,000 The reservoir was opened officially by the Commissioner of Public Works (Hon. M. Mclntosh) at Thevenard in June, 1928. The aggregate cost of

the reservoir, which has a capacity of 2,400,000,000 gallons, is £3,000,000. The scheme is a triumph of hy draulic engineering. Construction work Trias begun 11 years ago with the late Mr. E. J. Bradley as resident engineer. From October, 1926, all work was under the supervision of Mr. J. I. Miller, who was succeeded toward the end of last year by Mr. J. M. Wamian. Nearly 241 miles ~of trunk main have been laid, and the reticulation mains total 471£ miles. The mains

which ' serve Port Lincoln'' make a total length of 32£ miles. <Tod River takes its name from the late Mr. Robert Tod, who in an ex ploratory trip found the river in 1839. In the same and the following year Edward John Eyre explored the north ern and Western districts from Port Lincoln to King George's Sound. > Later surveys showed that most of the 23,000 square miles which com prise the peninsula was fertile agri cultural and pastoral land. Paucity of water, however, retard

ed development. The southern por tion of the peninsula, and extending along a portion of the eastern coast line, is featured by a series of low ranges and high, country. It was on those areas that hydraulic engineers saw the solution of the water problem. The late Mr. C. A. Bayer gave much of his time to the solving of the pro blem, and it was he who advised the Royal Commission in 1916 of the possibilities of Tod River. 'No other portion of South Aus tralia is so sorely in need of a perm

anent water supply as Eyre Peninsula'' the commission reported. ' Unless provision is made in this direction, without delay disastrous results to settlement, especially in the hundreds which have been opened, are inevit able. Through 'the absence of an ade quate water supply the development of vast areas of agricultural and graz ing land is being seriously retarded.' With the advice of Mr. Bayer accep ted, many thousands of acres other wise practically useless land have, been, and are still being opened up.