Standpipe dream

IT BEGGARS belief that the city council can be confident in proposing that a mere 200 standpipes will be sufficient to supply water to all the residents of Cape Town, even excluding those classified as “indigent”, for whom water supply points will continue as usual.

A little easy arithmetic will demonstrate how utterly ridiculous the provision of so few standpipes is. Suppose that it takes three minutes to pour each 25-litre quantity of water into the cans or bottles brought for the purpose.

In 24 hours there are 1 440 minutes, therefore each standpipe can serve only 1 440 ÷ 3 = 480 measures of 25 litres. Thus, 200 standpipes operating for 24 hours per day will only serve 96 000 such measures, ie, persons.

Excluding the indigent folk, the city has to provide some 3 million or more people with water every day. At the rate per standpipe calculated, we would need some 6 250 standpipes to serve 3 million people.

It’s obvious the idea of standpipes for all is totally impractical. Perhaps only those who have consumed more than 50 litres of water per person per day during February/March should be made to use the standpipes. That prospect would very soon bring everyone down to the 50-litre limit which, Mrs Zille says, would “cancel” Day Zero.

It seems the council has also not given sufficient thought to how the elderly and infirm folk will get their water if they have no one to help them.

I would also like to know whether anyone in the council has ever tried to carry 25 litres of water any distance by hand – it weighs 25kg – that’s heavy! David Jack Tokai