THE SMOKE OF SHEFFIELD.
'To the Editor of the SPECTATOR.] SIR,—Owing to topographical compulsion the only transportway through Sheffield is the valley of the Don, which is from 100 to 150 .feet above sea level. Consequently all the large works have been constructed along that valley -where also the railway track is laid. Though this is apt to give an unfavour- able impression to passers by, this localization of industrial pollution is not without advantage to the city. That there is a smoke canopy there of varying density cannot be denied, but the fact that the hills rise steeply from the valley gives easy opportunity to the citizens to get outside it. Sheffield is a city of hills, its highest point being 1426 feet above sea level, and about five miles west of the lowest point of the Don Valley, thus ensuring an exceptional diversity of domestic environment. Tests have been made in conjunction with the scheme of Dr. J. S. Owens to ascertain the impurities in various parts of the city, with very interesting results, too technical to elaborate in this brief letter. In regard to sun- light, however, some figures may he informative, and perhaps illuminating, Campbell-Stokes recorders having been fixed at various selected sites to test the whole city. Attercliffe, in the industrial area of the Don Valley, has the :lowest record, owing entirely to the smoke and dirt arising *ran the great works.
The following table giving the average annual amount of bright sunshine thus registered at tour different places, all in the city boundaries, in five equal years, may be worth consideration in arriving at the true value of a civic sense.
Average Yearly Sunshine. District.
Industrial . Industrial & Residential . Residential . Rural
High Hazels •in the east, immediately above the Don Valley, gets 30 per cent. more sunshine than Attercliffe, which is 150 feet below it, indicating that the smoke canopy does not rise very high ; while the remarkably equal distribution of stinehino in the other three districts at such differing heights shows that the sun's rays are not seriously dimmed by habi- tations. The fact that Weston Park, in a well-populated centre, at 450 feet, gets more sunshine than Lodge Moor, at 950 feet, in an agricultural and moorland district, testifies to the general purity of the air outside the restricted polluted area which railway travellers necessarily traverse on their journey passing Sheffield.
To take a wider comparison, the Registrar-General's mor- tality returns prove that Sheffield is one of the healthiest cities of the Kingdom, while meteorological records establish the fact that it gets more bright sunshine than other great manufacturing centres, and its sunshine record excels many
Hours
Height in feet
Attercliffe .. 956 ' .. 150 ..
High Hazels 1264 .. 800 .
Weston Park 1297 . . 450 .
Lodge Moor 1264 .. 950 .
residential towns.—I am, Sir, &c., E. HOWARTH. Sheffield.
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