A concrete shaft of identical dimensions exists on the footpath of St Paul's Terrace, opposite Gloucester Street.
Most people dumped refuse in the creeks and channels, trusting that stormwater would carry it away to the river, and for some years the Municipal Council considered drainage and sewerage as one and the same thing.
However, from about 1868 the Council adopted the policy of "rainfall to the river" and "sewerage to the land", developing a city drainage scheme to carry off stormwater and an earth closet sanitary service.
[1] The densely populated Booroodabin Division was annexed to the Municipality of Brisbane in 1903, and in 1908 a loan was secured to enable the council to complete the drainage of Merthyr, New Farm, Teneriffe, Bowen Hills, Mayne and Newstead by the end of 1909.
Monier's was the first true reinforced concrete, based on calculations which ensured that the steel was dispersed so as to take tension and shear forces.
The company constructed the first Monier system structure (a small arch for a storm water culvert) in Burwood, New South Wales, in 1894 and a sewer aqueduct linking the Sydney suburbs of Annandale and Balmain in 1895.
[1] During the financial year 1903–1904, the Brisbane Municipal Council authorised the spending of £1,537 on erecting sewer (drain) ventilating shafts wherever they were urgently needed.
[1] Monier Ventilation Shaft 1 (Spring Hill) was listed on the Queensland Heritage Register on 4 August 1998 having satisfied the following criteria.
The Monier Ventilation Shafts, constructed c. 1904, are important in illustrating late 19th/early 20th century attitudes toward public health and sanitation, and survive as visible evidence of Brisbane's early and extensive stormwater drainage scheme and venting system.
They provide rare surviving evidence of this early use of true reinforced concrete, and are significant as indicators of the technically advanced state of municipal engineering and construction in Brisbane at the turn of the 20th century.
They remain highly intact examples of their type and demonstrate engineering skill and involvement in creating aesthetically pleasing but functional structures.
They remain highly intact examples of their type and demonstrate engineering skill and involvement in creating aesthetically pleasing but functional structures.
They provide rare surviving evidence of this early use of true reinforced concrete, and are significant as indicators of the technically advanced state of municipal engineering and construction in Brisbane at the turn of the 20th century.