Water supply of the city

The first studies for distributing drinking water to supply the city date from 1890. Although the Municipal Council (Câmara Municipal) resolved at its meeting of 9 July 1891 to invite tenders for the works needed to secure this supply, it was only much later, after further painstaking studies, that contractors came forward for the works, which unfortunately are still not finished.

On 22 May 1900, in a proposal submitted to the Council under the terms of a notice dated 8 February, Luiz da Rocha Machado undertook to carry out all the works needed to supply drinking water and lay sewers in the city of Funchal for the sum of 359,000,000 réis (old Portuguese money of account; 1$000 = 1,000 réis, 1:000$000 = one conto = 1,000,000 réis). On 16 June following, the works were awarded to him, and the deed of award of the contract was signed on the 25th.

The decree of 14 August 1900 approved all the clauses of the contract concluded with Luiz da Rocha Machado except the one stipulating that the contractor would be the supplier of water to ships. Considering his interests harmed, he therefore asked for the contract to be rescinded, and the Council granted this before any work had been carried out.

Despite this setback, the Council did not give up on providing Funchal with an improvement that hygiene and public convenience demanded. On 19 July 1908 it resolved to take out a loan of 400 contos from the Caixa Geral dos Depósitos, at 5% interest, for the planned works; the sum was to be paid to the municipality in instalments of 50 contos as the works required. Half of the said 400 contos, with the corresponding interest, would be borne by the State and the other half by the District General Council (Junta Geral), all in accordance with the ministerial order of 25 January 1906 and the resolution passed by the General Council at its meeting of 4 July 1908.

The contract between the Council and the Caixa Geral dos Depósitos for this loan is dated 22 August 1908. On 17 October following, tenders were invited for the works to capture the water of the Tornos (‘water turns’) springs and pipe it to a reservoir to be built in the locality (sítio) of Caminho dos Saltos (‘road of the falls’), with a reserve price of 32,030,000 réis.

At the council meeting of 22 December 1908 the two bidders, Luiz da Rocha Machado and João Albino Rodrigues de Sousa, undertook to carry out the said works for 24,380,000 réis, and the contract was awarded to them by a termo (municipal jurisdictional district, a subdivision of the comarca) drawn up in the Council's secretariat on 23 January of the following year.

The works were completed on 22 October 1910, and on 22 November 1911 the Council put out to tender the complete execution of all the works for supplying drinking water and laying sewers in the city of Funchal, setting the base price for bids at 263,460 escudos.

No bids were received in this tender, so two more were opened, with a new base price of 276,633 escudos. The contract was finally awarded on 21 October 1912 to João Pinto Correia, who had undertaken to carry out all the works for 316,000,000 réis.

The District Commission (Comissão Distrital) did not approve this award of the contract, and so on 14 June 1913 the Council announced that a public tender for the said works was open once again. The contract went on 26 July of the same year to the commercial firm Luiz da Rocha Machado & C.ª, which had offered a bid 24,650,000 réis below the base price. That base price was 323,500,000 réis, of which 161,400,000 réis was for the water-supply works and 162,100,000 réis for the sewerage works.

The Council’s resolution awarding the contract to this firm was confirmed by the District Commission on 8 August 1913, and on the 23rd of the same month and year the contract was signed. It was later amended by the terms set out in the instrument drawn up on 22 September 1914.

The Administrative Committee (Comissão Administrativa) of the Levada de Santa Luzia (‘St Lucy’s channel’) tried on several occasions to obstruct the use of the waters of Tornos for the city’s supply, but the Municipal Council (Câmara Municipal) at last reached an agreement with it. A deed was signed on 3 July 1912 recognising the Municipality’s right to draw from those same springs, for that purpose, a continuous flow of 18 litres of water per second. This deed, under which the Council also made some concessions to the said levada (irrigation channel), was published in nos 11,291, 11,292 and 11,293 of the Funchal newspaper Diário de Notícias (‘Daily News’). Now that the Council had the means and resources needed to provide the city with drinking water and a good sewer network, it seemed impossible that any obstacle could arise to the completion of so important an improvement, above all once the works had been awarded. Neither the Council nor the public, however, had reckoned with the European war, which was to drive up the price of building materials extraordinarily and make it impossible to carry out the works on the terms of the award.

On 29 November 1916 the Council granted a petition from the contractor, dated the 20th of the same month, requesting the rescission of the contract for the water supply and sewerage of Funchal. On 25 July of the following year the contractor received 80,029,468 réis as the balance of the price of the work he had carried out. Before this he had received 20,814,918 réis on 22 April 1915 and 8,041,805 réis on 8 April 1916, so that the total sum paid to him by the Council was 108,886,191 réis.

The contractor laid water and sewer pipes in Avenida Manuel de Arriaga and Rua da Imperatriz, and sewer pipes only in Rua das Hortas, from Avenida de João de Deus to Avenida de Pedro José de Ornelas, etc. Besides these pipelines, when the contract was rescinded the Council received various machinery, tools, equipment and materials. Later, and now at its own expense, it replaced the water mains from Saltos (‘falls’) to Torreão (‘turret’), and from there to the fountain of the College (Colégio). As can be seen from the above, much remains to be done to provide Funchal with good drinking water and a modern sewerage system. However, now that the European war is over and the main obstacles to continuing the works have gone, it is reasonable to hope that they will soon resume. This is essential to strengthen the reputation of a city visited by foreigners, whose climate has earned the highest praise from many distinguished physicians. On 18 March 1929 the Administrative Committee (Comissão Administrativa) of Funchal Municipal Council (Câmara Municipal do Funchal) resolved that its chairman, Captain Francisco Silvestre Varela, should go to Lisbon to take up with the central government various matters of great concern to the municipality, above all the city’s sanitation works. On 14 June of that year Decree no. 16,956 was published, authorising the Council to borrow seven thousand contos (1 conto = 1,000,000 réis, from 1911 1,000 escudos) from the Caixa Geral dos Depósitos, to be used solely for carrying out those works.

On 3 November 1931 the engineer Rodrigo Guimarães was commissioned to update the drinking-water supply project drawn up by the engineers João Von Hafe and Adriano Trigo. On 19 January 1932 the laying of water mains in the lower part of the city, bounded by the sea to the south and by the 60-metre contour line to the north, was put out to award by public auction (arrematação) for the sum of 209,250.00 escudos (Portuguese currency from 1911, = 1,000 réis). These works began in February 1932 and were completed on 3 November 1933.

At the council meeting of 13 November 1932 the Municipal Services (Serviços Municipalizados) were created, charged in particular with overseeing the sanitation works and the distribution of drinking water to homes. The tender for the award of the contract for the pipework in the middle and upper parts of the city twice attracted no bidders, so the Municipal Services took on these works themselves, estimated at 552,259.00 escudos, ‘a short section fed by a siphon to be built in the Ribeira de Santa Luzia still remaining to be completed’, and 3,700 metres of piping having already been laid.

The immediate construction of a large concrete reservoir on the Levada de Santa Luzia, with a capacity of 7,000 cubic metres, had become essential. The contract was awarded for 753,640.00 escudos, and the reservoir was inaugurated with great ceremony on 27 May 1934.