"BONUS FOR DELAY."

Auckland Star, Volume LX, Issue 10, 12 January 1929, Page 17

"BONUS FOR DELAY."

HIGHWAY BOARD SUBSIDIES. LOCAL .BODIES DISSATISFIED. APPLICATION FOR REDRESS. The policy of the Main Highways Board of paying a £3 for £1 subsidy on the construction of main roads is causing heartburnings amongst local body representatives who were responsible for laying down certain of the main roads when the subsidy was £1 for £1. Tlie local authorities who were responsible for tin: work on the Great South Road are particularly concerned as the eubsirljes they received were based on bitumen and did not amount to over knlf tin , actual cast of the concrete. The question has been taken up by the Auckland Suburban Local Bodies' Association, which last evening decided to • pply to the Minister of Public Works ■ iid the chairman of the Highways Board for monetary assistance to compensate local authorities for disadvantages under which they were labouring. It was pointed out that the Highways Board was now in a better financial position than when the Great South Foarl was concreted and the petrol tax feyenue had since become available. Papatoetoe's Claim. Mr. J. Nicholson, chairman of the oii<i lift; committee of the Papatoetoe Town Board, stated that the 73 chains lafd down by his board had coat £8259, of which the board paid £4958 and the Highways Board £3301. The Town Board had thus paid 13/2 in the £. He suggested that in view of the fact that subsidies were being increased on all new work the Highways Board should pay £17. r » per annum, representing half the interest and sinking fund the Town Board was now paying. The chairman of the Manurewa Town Board (Mr. O. Gallaher) said his section of the road cost £15,864, of which £8764 was found by the Town Board and €7100 by the Highways Board. The Town Board would be paying, only £39ttH on a subsidy of £3 for £1, and relief mi the rate would be one-fifth of a penny.

Heavy Traffic at Manurewa. Ample justification for the construction of the concrete road existed, in the opinion of Mr.. VV. R. Frost (Manurewa), despite the Highways Board's original advocacy of bitumen. A traffic tally at Manurewa at the time the work was being carried out showed that the number of vehicles passing over the road daily was about 300. This tally was considered necessary to justify a recommendation fov bitumen which was strongly made by the Highways Board, but it was not taken into account that traffic greatly increased when a better road was formed. Proof of this increase was shown by a tally taken on December l!>. just prior to the Christina* n»h, when 11."i4 vi-liM-U-s were counted between 6 a.m. and 10 p.m. Only 2.68 per cent of the tally, or 31 vericles, consisted of motors registered or owned' inManu-

rewa. On the following day 1252 vehicles were counted, 63 being registered or owned in the Manurewa district. No count was" taken during the week-end, but the traffic was then much greater. Further indication of the fact that a great bulk of the traffic was from outside the district, said MV. Frost, was that only two out of 207 Vehicles of one ton capacity or upwards, counted on December 19, belonged to Manurewa owners— less than one per cent. On December 26 vehicles of one ton and over numbered 182, and only three were owned in the district. That an injustice was imposed on local bodies which" by their enterprise had provided splendid roads and were now paying for them was the opinion of the chairman (Mr. F. J. O'Meara, Newmarket. In contrast local bodies which had neglected to put their roads in proper order were benefiting by the Highways Board's generosity. He regarded the assistance now given as "a bonus for delay." "It is reasonable to ask for a slice of the large accretions to the Highways Board's funds now being obtained from the petrol tax," said Mr. Nicholson, in moving thai the Highways Board should be asked to make some redress. The motion was carried.