engineering

Lambeth Waterworks Company

Lambeth Waterworks Company is a engineering topic covered in the lgStudy science library. This page brings together a partial reference excerpt, illustrations, worked examples, real-world applications and a short study plan, so you can understand Lambeth Waterworks Company rather than just read about it. In short: The Lambeth Waterworks Company was a utility company supplying water to parts of south London in England. The company was established in 1785 with works in north Lambeth and became part of the publicly owned Metropolitan Water Board in 1904.

Key takeaways

Lambeth Waterworks Company belongs to engineering; place it in that map before memorising details.
Learn the definition first, then one example that makes the definition concrete.
Connect Lambeth Waterworks Company to a quantity you can measure, compute or draw — that is where exam questions come from.
Reproduce the core statement of Lambeth Waterworks Company from memory before moving on to harder problems.

Reference excerpt

The Lambeth Waterworks Company was a utility company supplying water to parts of south London in England. The company was established in 1785 with works in north Lambeth and became part of the publicly owned Metropolitan Water Board in 1904.

Origins

The Lambeth Waterworks Company, founded by the Lambeth Waterworks Act 1785 (25 Geo. 3. c. 89) to supply water to south and west London, established premises on the south bank of the River Thames close to the present site of Hungerford Bridge where the Royal Festival Hall now stands. The company's first water-intake lay on the south side of the river, supplied directly from the river. After complaints that the water was foul, the intake was moved to the middle of the river. The Company expanded to supply Kennington in 1802 and about this time replaced its wooden pipes with iron ones.

Infrastructure

In 1832 the company built a reservoir at Streatham Hill, and then obtained the Lambeth Waterworks Act 1834 (4 & 5 Will. 4. c. vii) to extend its area of supply. In the same year the company purchased 16 acres (65,000 m2) of land in Brixton and built a reservoir and works on Brixton Hill adjacent to Brixton Prison. Around the 1850s the quality of drinking water became a matter of public concern, and John Snow examined the state of waters in 1849. Parliament passed the Metropolis Water Act 1852 to "make provision for securing the supply to the Metropolis of pure and wholesome water". Under the act, it became unlawful for any water company to extract water for domestic use from the tidal reaches of the Thames after 31 August 1855, and from 31 December 1855 all such water was required to be "effectually filtered". The directors had already decided in 1847 to move the intake for their reservoirs to Seething Wells. The facilities were completed in 1852, and the Lambeth was joined there taking advantage of its pipes to the city by the Chelsea Waterworks Company. The facilities played a role in John Snow's statistical investigations during a cholera outbreak, the facility was further upriver than many other waterworks and hence had cleaner water, leading to fewer cholera deaths. However the inlets pumped in too much silt with the water because of turbulence caused by the discharge (confluence) of the River Mole/Ember and The Rythe into the Thames immediately upstream. The Lambeth Waterworks Company thus moved upstream to Molesey between Sunbury and Molesey Locks, where they built the Molesey Reservoirs in 1872 and the Chelsea Waterworks Company followed them there three years later.

See also London water supply infrastructure

Notes

References

Illustrations

Worked examples

Example 1 — a first encounter with Lambeth Waterworks Company

Start with the simplest possible case. Write down what Lambeth Waterworks Company claims or describes in one sentence, then invent the smallest concrete situation in which that sentence is true. In engineering, the smallest case is usually a single object, a single equation or a single measurement. Check that every symbol or term in your sentence has a meaning in that case.

Example 2 — changing one variable

Take the situation from Example 1 and change exactly one quantity: double it, halve it, or set it to zero. Predict what should happen to Lambeth Waterworks Company before you calculate. Comparing your prediction with the result is the fastest way to find out whether you understand the idea or only the words.

Example 3 — an exam-style question

Typical questions about Lambeth Waterworks Company ask you to (a) state it precisely, (b) apply it to given data, and (c) explain a limitation. Practise writing all three answers in under five minutes; the third part is what separates a full-mark answer from an average one.

Applications of Lambeth Waterworks Company

In research: Lambeth Waterworks Company appears in engineering research whenever the underlying quantities have to be modelled precisely. Papers usually cite it as a starting assumption and then explore where it breaks down.
In technology and industry: Engineering practice reuses Lambeth Waterworks Company in design rules, simulations and safety margins. Knowing the idea lets you read a specification sheet and understand why the numbers look the way they do.
In the classroom: Lambeth Waterworks Company is common in secondary-school and first-year university syllabi. It links to neighbouring topics 1785 establishments in England, British companies established in 1785, Companies established in 1785, so understanding it makes those chapters shorter.
In everyday life: Look for Lambeth Waterworks Company outside the textbook — in sport, cooking, traffic, electronics or the sky above you. An example you found yourself is remembered far longer than one you were given.

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How to study Lambeth Waterworks Company in 20 minutes

Read the reference excerpt below once, without taking notes.
Close the page and write down what Lambeth Waterworks Company means in your own words.
Compare your version with the excerpt and mark what you missed.
Work through the three examples above with pen and paper.
Explain Lambeth Waterworks Company out loud to somebody else — or to Teacher Smith in the lgStudy chat.

Frequently asked questions

What is Lambeth Waterworks Company in simple terms?

Why does Lambeth Waterworks Company matter?

Because it connects several engineering ideas at once: it gives you a definition you can apply, a quantity you can calculate, and a way to check whether a result is plausible.

How should I study Lambeth Waterworks Company?

Read the excerpt, restate it from memory, then work through the examples and applications listed on this page. The five-step study plan above takes about twenty minutes.

What does this page cover?

It gives you a compact reference excerpt plus original lgStudy explanations, examples, applications and study material on Lambeth Waterworks Company.