The Perils of 'Fantastic' Street Engineering
Complaints emerge regarding city contractors creating basins and trenches that trap water, creating eyesores and potential health hazards.
The story, cleaned up
A cleaned-up reading of the newspaper page: spelling and layout repaired, one story lifted off a crowded page. It follows the original closely but it is not a transcription. The original page is below; read it if a detail matters.
The Chronicle yesterday called attention to a sort of basin dug by the street contractors on Fourth street, near Marion. Another basin was partially created on Third street last year, at the intersection of Cherry, leaving a hole at least four feet deep. That hole is today the chief blemish to Third street from Mill to Pine. Another cause of complaint is the trenches dug for sidewalks on the north end of Ninth street. These trenches are now full of water, and the youngsters are having fine times in them. The frogs, of course, will later do the same. These low, wet places will be most prolific disease breeders by and by. Sewerage and filth generally will make their homes in them, and in the shape of diphtheria and typhoid fever will make their presence constantly known. It costs more to build sidewalks in this way, and nobody likes them, and yet their building goes right on all the same.
“These low, wet places will be most prolific disease breeders by and by.”
Early Seattle infrastructure was defined by haphazard grading and environmental manipulation, often leading to public health risks. The frustration with 'unaccountable and stupid' municipal engineering persists in contemporary debates over sidewalk maintenance and street design.
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