13° Julii, 1927.]

13. And eight of them, I think, were, or professed to be, intimately acquainted with this particular river?-Yes.

14. Now was the technical evidence tnus placed at your disposal very carefully considered by you?-Yes.

15. And did you, in addition, with your colleagues visit the locality and see for yourselves the state of matters?— Yes.

16. In consequence of your study of the whole question, with the assistance cf the evidence you had received, did you and your colleagues come to the conclusions which are set out in the Report as to the works which required to be done? -Yes.

17. You may recall, if you were in the room yesterday, that I read certain passages from pages 15 and 38 as to the impression formed by the Commission as to the urgency of the matter?-Yes.

18. May I take it that that embodied your views as well as the views of your colleagues?-Certainly.

19. The works recommended by the Commission are the works which now find their place in the Bill, in Part 1 of the Third Schedule, are they not?—Yes.

20. Let us just look at them for a moment and have them in mind in going through your evidence. The first of those proposed works is the dredging and training of the outfall channel between the north end of the Marsh Cut and Hull Sand Beacon ?—Yes.

21. Would you be good enough to tell this Committee the nature of the existing works at the outlet? This is at the seaward end of the works, is it not?Yes.

very

22. Will you tell the Committee the nature of the ground and the water there and the nature of the existing works?-Yes. I think they are clearly shown on this photograph, if I may show it to the Committee; it is almost better than trying to explain it in words.

23. I have not seen that. I should like to see it very much? There are copies of it, I think. It is numbered 1.

Mr. Macmillan.] Naturally, my Lord, we have not many copies of this photograph.

Chairman.] I do not know how far this part of Mr. Binnie's evidence is going to be cross-examined to or opposed.

Mr. Macmillan. I do not know whether it is or not, my Lord.

At any

[Continued.

rate we can supply one or two sets of the photographs.

(Copies of photographs are handed in.)

Mr. Macmillan.

24. Do you now show the Committee a series of photographs which you have had taken to give an impression of the character of the terrain at the seaward outfall?-Yes.

On

25. Just take the first one and tell us what it is? This photograph shows the channel carried out from beyond the end of what they call the Marsh Cut. the right hand side of the photograph you will see a man standing up on what is the end of the Marsh Cut, which is is gradually crumbling away at the present time. You see the channel; there are two banks, stone training walls which are carried out to seaward about a mile, which you see on the left hand top side of the picture; and the West Stone Bank Beacon which will presently be referred to, is shown as a dot on the left hand side; there is the West Stone Bank and the East Stone Bank; those were works which were carried out in 1852; they were completed in 1853 by the Norfolk Estuary Company and really constitute the last works of improvement which have been carried out on the Ouse. The photograph shows the accumulation which is taking place behind the training walls, those training walls being carried up to below low water of neap tide only, this photograph being taken on the end of the ebb. There are various gaps in the walls and they were in a somewhat dilapidated condition, and it is a very shallow channel at present between the two.

Sir Murdoch Macdonald.

26. Would the witness at this stage say what depth of water at flood tide would be over that ground?-Yes, I think, I can give that. It varies from time to time. I have some sections showing the bed of the river which I was going to put in at a little later stage so as to show how it has risen.

Mr. Macmillan.] I think you might postpone the answer to Sir Murdoch for a moment just to keep the train of your evidence in order.

Sir Murdoch Macdonald.] Certainly. Mr. Macmillan.] What is your second photograph?

13° Julii, 1927.]

Mr. Riley.

27. Does the first photograph show the river at low water?-Yes. The tops of those training walls are generally below low water level of neap tides; they are not carried any higher than that. That is the end of the stable channel. I would like to show you the chart next; that is, carrying out to sea now beyond the end of the training walls.

Mr. Macmillan.

28. Yes. Would you show the Committee your map which is called W.J.E.B.1? -Yes.

(The map is handed in.)

29. Will you just explain what this map is? In order to obtain some stable channel it would be necessary to carry out training walls into the Wash, and this map was prepared for the purpose of studying the direction which those channels should take. The full lines show the state of affairs when the Admiralty chart and soundings were prepared in 1924. It is tinted in three shades of blue, varying with the depth of water, the water over five fathoms being the darkest colour; between five fathoms and low water the next lightest tint; and between low water of spring tides and high water the lightest tint of all. The advance seaward of the shore of the Wash is between 1829 and 1924, shown by the brown edging.

30. Is that the extent to which the land has gained on the sea?—Yes.

31, Now I want to draw attention at once on this chart to the existing works. Do you show there at the bottom of the map the Ouse finding its way to the sea through a defined channel? Yes.

32. And is the mark there the end of the Marsh Cut-that is, the end of the existing channel, a channel which has become dilapidated through tidal action and through wear and tear?—Yes.

33. Then you have there "End of existing training walls" just a little further seaward, and then you have two parallel lines carried beyond that: These are lines which show the proposed extension of the training walls?—Yes.

34. Now coming back to your photographs, can you indicate what the photographs show us on the chart? Where are we standing?-The photograph shows that the training walls, so far as they

[Continued.

have been constructed, have been useful in maintaining the channel through the sand banks. Returning to the chart, the sand banks are shown by the lightest coloured blue, and it will be seen that in 1824 there were three channels through which the Ouse was discharging to the sea. There was one between Hull Sand and Thief Sand to the west; then there was the Teetotal Channel between Thief Sand and Daseleys Sand; and there was Daseleys Sled between Daseleys Sand and Pandora Sand; those are three mouths through which the Ouse was then making its way to the sea. At the time when the Commission visited these banks Daseleys Sled was closed at its southern end and the water was making its way to the sea through the Teetotal Channel and between Thief Sand and Hull Beacon, the navigable channel for ships approaching King's Lynn. You will see Lynn Channel marked "Roaring Middle" and up that

course.

It was considered essential that the ebb tide should be excluded as far as possible from subsidiary channels and concentrated into one channel. The first question which arose therefore was: Which of these channels is the best one? With the idea of determining that question, I went to the Hydrographic Department of the Admiralty and got all the charts which had been prepared from various dates, from 1829 on to 1924; they were on different scales, but the Admiralty kindly produced all on one scale for us, and it is the comparison between 1829 and 1924.

35. Does that show there has not been very much difference?—Not of the deepwater channels; the deepwater channels have remained fairly stable; that is, over the five-fathom line. The thin dotted line on these plans represents the deepwater level as it existed in 1829. There is not a great deal of difference between the deepwater channel as it existed then and to-day. That decided the Commission, together with the evidence which was placed before them on behalf of the Port of King's Lynn, the Conservators and the Harbour, that that was the best channel to adopt; that is, the Lynn Channel to drain out in that direction.

36. I want to get first of all from you a description of the existing state of matters. You have been describing just now your remedy for them and the selection of the remedy, but we have not yet got from you a short description, which I should like to have, of what exists

13° Julii, 1927.]

there just now. Has the method been adopted of carrying the Ouse through training walls to the sea?--Yes, that is shown.

37. When was that work done originally? That was finished in 1852 or 1853. 38. And how far out to sea were the training walls carried into the Wash?— The end is given on the chart.

39. Now what is the purpose of putting training walls there? Before we get the length of discussing what additional training walls were put down, I want to know what is the purpose of putting training walls there?-The purpose of them is to concentrate the water in some definite channel and so get the advantage of the scour of the water, the effect of the ebb as it goes through between the training walls.

40. We will develop that a little later on, the advantage of having a concentrated channel instead of a dissipated channel; but taking the existing works, the training walls which end now as shown on your chart, what is the condition of those training walls? They are dilapidated; there are many gaps in them; they are not carried high enough.

If

41. Consequently do do they fail to achieve the purpose of training the water? No, they train it, but they have a channel of an insufficient depth, and also they are obstructed at the seaward end by sand banks; those sand banks are continually shifting their position. you go one day, almost from week to week, the navigable channel is varying. If you look at the 1924 chart, they give notice to navigators on the chart to that effect, or to the effect that the buoys and lights are continually being shifted.

42. You need not vouch that by a chart; I think it will be accepted at once. The position therefore is this, that the natural River Ouse finds its outlet into the Wash, which at the upper end is a shallow sand-beset estuary?—Yes.

43. Is the problem therefore this, that if you want to get rid of the water you have got to get it led seaward to deep water? Yes.

44. And that was the purpose of those works in 1850?-Yes.

45. Was it one of the conclusions of your Commission that these training walls themselves were dilapidated and encumbered with siltage and that they did not go far enough seaward to achieve their purpose?-They were neither carried

[Continued.

high enough nor did they proceed far enough seaward.

46. And so far as they did exist, they were being silted up and not even serving the purpose which they originally served? They were obstructed beyond the point of discharge.

47. We were looking at a series of photographs, and then somehow or other we stopped. Is it desirable to go through them?-Before dealing with the next photograph, I want to deal with the question of the second object of the training walls.

48. Do, please. Tell us that. What is the second object of the training walls?-At the present moment the spring tide velocity bringing the water up the Ouse is as high as between five and six miles an hour; and samples show that the quantity of silt in suspension is somewhere about 76 parts per 100,000. The ebb velocity is only a little over two miles an hour, and the quantity brought back seaward is about 46 parts per 100,000.

49. And is the difference left in the channel? The difference is left somewhere up the Ouse; that is on spring tides. On neap tides there is not much difference in the velocities of ebb and flow, and there is practically no deposit. The Commission had samples taken at various points along the navigation channel in order to determine if there was any point where water, when admitted, would be comparatively free from silt, and they found that at Hull Sand Beacon on the tide there was only an average of

50. Let us identify Hull Sand Beacon on your chart.-Yes. The observations were taken near the Beacon just beyond the end of the two red walls; that was one place. Observations were taken at Whiting Beacon, which is a little further out to sea; and observations were taken opposite West Bank Beacon, to illustrate the class of water which is now entering the Ouse. To cut a long story short, at Hull Sand Beacon there was an average of something like seven parts of silt in suspension per 100,000 during various stages of the tide, as against an average of 37 parts per 100,000 at West Bank Beacon; and at Whiting Beacon, instead of getting an improvement, we found 8 parts per 100,000; so it looked as if by carrying it as far as the end of the training walls shown upon the map we should

13° Julii, 1927.]

have effected the dual object of excluding the subsidiary channels and also allowing a water fairly free from silt to enter the river.

51. That was to guide you to the point to which you would take your training walls? Yes.

52. And that was determined in turn by the contents of the water?-Yes.

53. Now was the result of the existing state of matters, together with the existing shorter termination of the training channels and the consequent admission of water charged with suspended particles, this: That the level of the bed has been raiesed 7.1 feet between 1883 and 1892 as an average between Denvers Sluice and the sea?As an average, yes.

54. Just tell me this, Mr. Binnie. 1 do not know, but is there any deposit also brought down from above as wellfresh water-borne deposit, I mean?—I do not think there is very much. We investigated that point at Denvers

Sluice. Denvers Sluice being closed against the tide and the water being stored there, affords one an opportunity of seeing whether there is much silt deposit, but I do not think there is much; it all comes up from the Wash practically.

55. Therefore it was evidently a vital point in your investigation to determine the point to which you were to take out the new training wall? Yes.

56. First of all, you are satisfied with the policy of training walls?—Yes. Mr. Campbell.] What are the training walls made of?

Mr. Macmillan.

con

57. Will you describe how you struct the training walls, Mr. Binnie? I think you have some drawings coming in a moment.-Yes. It is very difficult to describe them. These sand banks are so friable that the Commission came to the conclusion that it would be impossible to put stone training walls on them similar to the ones at the end of the Marsh Cut; there is no foundation there; there is a little clay at the end of the Marsh Cut; that disappeared; it is very, very friable silt right out into the Wash. The consequence was that they came to the conclusion after consulting a good number of people, that the best thing to do would be to drive longitudinal piles tied back, of which I

[Continued.

could show a sketch if necessary; it is difficult to explain it in words. (Sketch W.J.E.B. No. 2 is handed in.)

58. There are a lot of diagrams shown on this "W.J.E.B. No. 2." Perhaps you might explain to my uninstructed mind what they mean? This is a sketch showing what formed the basis of the estimate.

59. You told us that had to be done by sheet piling on each side of the channel. You are going to tie back the piling so that the piling may not turn turtle owing to the pressure of the sand and the silt behind it? Yes.

60. Is there any representation in this detailed drawing in profile of a bank, or what do you show us here?-There is a Vertical Section. Minus 18.7 shows the average bottom. This is a sort of average section taking through the training wall. There is a long pile which is shown carried down to 33 feet.

61. Help us a little better, Mr. Binnie. Tell us, first of all, which one you are looking at?-It is marked "Vertical Section." I just wanted to deal with that first. The actual line of section is the panel pile which is not carried down far below the bottom of the channel, in fact, only just carried down below it. That is shown on the Vertical Section on the right in full black. If you look on the left at the Plan," you see the plan of that. It is 5 feet long, with a maximum thickness of 9 inches. Under the word "Plan," looking away to the left, it shows a plan looking down on the top of that panel pile. In order to prevent these panels being forced forward under the pressure of the silt, there are two other piles which are shown driven down 12 feet below it on the Vertical Section, and those are shown in plan, looking to the left, with the panel pile resting against them. Then, again, turning to the Vertical Section, you see the King pile at the back, which is driven down 30 feet below the top of the sand, and the tie bar connecting the main pile with this King pile is shown horizontally. That tie bar is also shown to the left on this plan, and the elevation of this system of piles is shown below the vertical section. It shows the main piles carried down to a certain depth and the panel piles to a much smaller depth at the sides of the channel. The rest is mere detail.