Discussion on Papers 10–13

MR MIDMER and MR BROWN, Paper 11 There are five towns in the Thanet area with a population of 180 000: large in British terms for seaside towns. The area embraces ten miles on the north coast and seven on the east. Before 1973 the three district councils considered the report of a consulting engineer. The first choice of a joint outfall at Broadstairs was rejected, and a revised scheme agreed for a joint sewage treatment works at Richborough. In the late 1970s a reservoir enquiry drew attention to the possible use of effluent in the River Stour.

This background forced the careful consideration of alternatives to the present sites where outfalls discharge. There are twin pipes at Margate built in the chalk cliff (Fig. 1), and Broadstairs (Fig. 2) is rather similar with cliff protection. At Ramsgate the harbour is growing and getting closer to the outfall (Fig. 3) and nearby Pegwell Bay has a long sand foreshore.