New-York tribune., 1908-09-27
MUNICIPAL NOVELTIES.
High Pressure Hose Carts ts-Deaf
and Dumb Public School.

New York is embarking on a number Of mu-
nicfpaI novelties designed to promote the gen.
eraI welfare, but the effects Of which are some
times unexpected and startling For exampe
a new high pressure hose cart which was going
to 4 fire the other day found that it could not
pass an old-fashiOned horse car in Prince street
The quick witted firernen had never contem-
plated such an emergency, due TO the extreme
width of the new apparatus. but they rose TO it
by deraiIfne the horse car and setting it on one
side Of the street Then there room for
the high pressure outfit to proceed
1t looks as If the picturesque and glittering
fire engine that beIches black smoke as il thun-
ders around the corner is doomed TO extinction
with the arrival of the cOldIy busnesslike hose
cart Who wants to chase after a smokeless
wagon piled with lengths of hose and which
has no steam TO blow off? Even the horses who
used to draw the old engines with gallant energy
and excitement feel the difference as they gal
Iop off with the new apparatus. If it were not
for the changing Of the same old locomotive bell
the horses would hardly be able to stand it at
all Thus declare the wise ones at firehouse
20, in Lafayette street, where Captain Dan"
Roach is in charge of two high pressure carts.
There is one cart at the quarters of No. 70. in
East 18th street, between University Place and
Fifth avenue. Although other cities, as Phil
ade1phfa and Chicago, use the high pressure
system the first practical test in New York is
now under way The area Of high pressure
hydrants extends southwark from 23d street
covering mainly the business districts.
The hose carts. which weigh about as much
as the fve-ton engines they have superseded
carry two thousand feet of five-ply rubber hose
The tubing is necessarily stronger than the old
kind for it must withstand water pressure
of three hundred pounds TO the square inch
The fire engines usually give only half this
pressure. Behind the drivers seat on the hose
carts projects a four-foot brass nozzle which
can be turned in any direction to shoot the con-
centrated volume of water from three lines OF
hose Such stream will go further and with
greater force than anything yet available. Six
teen brass nozzles of various sizes carried
on the sides of the cart. A metal handrail
above the piled hose is provided for the crew Of
eight men TO hang on by.
An innovation rather remarkable is the beard
of water supply police which is organized Hot
to insure a sanitary water supply for the city
or to guard the property persons Of New
Workers The object is 70 protect the rural in
habitants in the neighbCrhOOd of the AshOkan
dam project and to suppress riots among per-
sons employed on said work" There are now
twenty thousand Slavs, Italians and negroes en-
ployed on the work, and eventually there may
be a population of two hundred thousand la
borers strung along distance of one hundred
and twenty miles north of White Plains. The
exact Jurisdiction and sphere of influence Of the
water police are not yet determined The men
are at present patroIling for half a mile on
either side of the 200-fOOt strip where the WORK
of construction is proceeding, and they are
under the ultimate authority Of the sherifs OF
the six counties involved. The force was or
ganized last March under command of Captain
Rhinelander Waldo, formerly Deputy Pohce
Commissioner and Captain Douglass I. Mckay
who resigned from the United States coast ar