Holló Szilvia Andrea: Budapest's Public Works - Our Budapest (Budapest, 2010)
Developing utilities on doctor's orders
Reitter worked out every detail of the canalisation to be implemented on the Pest side, departing from the tracks of the system only where the comprehensive city plan required him to do so. According to a report made by the BPW, the "alignment of the Grand Boulevard wai laid out, in accordance with Bazelgette's canalisa- tion plan, in the deepeit-lying location of the city in order that the trunk iewer could be laid beneath it. " When Sugárút (today's Andrássy út) was built, it was already evident under the surface that a metropolis was now in the making: "the underground piping id alio of interest here ... How many sewers, water and gas mains jostle each other side by side or one above the other crisscrossing in a pattern tike the warp and weht oh a net! And yet there is method in it: one does not impede the other and each occupies the best place possible for them all to be ready to hand." Flushgates were inserted into the system at certain points to clear sludge deposited in the sewers by suddenly allowing the dammed-up water to rush through them. In March of 1875, the Board of Public Works invited tenders for the preparation of working drawings for the sewer system with a view to the entire area of Budapest as "these sewerage works will cost millions to build and remain in service hor centuries. ” The tender invitation prescribed the use of Reitter's basic conception and offered a prize of a hundred gold pieces to the winner. Lajos Bodoky, Lajos Lechner, József Vogler and the French trio of engineers Durand, Clay and Mille were invited to enter competitive designs. In June of 1877, the jury, which included renowned professionals, recommended the blueprints made by Lajos Lechner to be awarded first prize. For the execution of the project a sewerage and waterworks department was set up under the aegis of the Budapest Engineering Bureau in 1883. The person appointed head of the department was Ottó Martin, whose first task was to draw up a comprehensive plan for the canalisation of Pest with the essential stipulation that "the trunk main in the boulevard be by all means included, the whole inhabited area oh Pest be covered, and basement soils be dehydrated." Although Martin's work was introduced to the municipal assembly in 1884, the implementation of his plan was delayed in spite of the fact that the blueprints were examined, and where necessary refined, by a team of leading experts. Finally it was in 1891 that construction work started. The work was carried out with so much circumspection that when the account was balanced in 1915, it was found that the overall expenditure fell short of the approved budget. The construction of the 26-kilometre trunk main was started in 1893. The sections along the Grand Boulevard and the Danube bank were joined at Boráros tér from 70
