THE WANGANUI.

Auckland Star, Volume LXXI, Issue 205, 29 August 1940, Page 5

THE WANGANUI.

W. T. DOWNES , RIVER. NOW UNDER PUBLIC WORKS. (By J.C.) The change in the administration of the Wanganui River will be followed

with much interest by the people,' pakeha and Maori, who live on the banks of that long waterway, and those who have occasion to use it for travel. It was announced recently that the river will no longer be dealt with by tbe trust board, which will now cease to exist. The Public Works Department will in future undertake the expenditure of any funds voted for maintenance and improvement of the river a> a i.avigable channel, and the Lands Department will manage the Domain lands, over 30.000 acres, which border the river. Some £000 per annum is produced in revenue from the leased lands on the sides of the Wangauui. This has heretofore been spent on improvements to the channel and the care of the banks. Now there will be no sj>ecial revenue available for the river; all the money will go into the Consolidated Fund.

I This change—though it is not so stated—is, I.think, a consequence of the death two years ago oJ Mr. W. T. Downes, of Wanjianui. who was the life and soul of all the work undertaken for the preservation of the scenic beauty and tlie maintenance of the channel of navigation. For many years he was the supervisor of the River Trust and its ;principal moving spirit. He lived on the riverside; he cruised up and down the river in his motor launch, and at an earlier period he made many long canoe journey*. He knew every elbow and every curve, cliff and cave from Wan~ajnui town to Taumarunui. a distance of l'M> miles. He gathered its history from lihe Maoris who lived in the many villages, and who had fought against or for the white Government. He wrote : a bout the Wanganui—he preferred t<i i!*ive it its correct spelling, Whangaaui,

with the "h , *—and published several books about it- He grieved to see how settlement and bushfelling had despoiled it in the upper parts and spoiled the navigable channel by causing landslips, accumulation of shoals, and aggravating the alternate heavy floods with a. rapid run-off and the siltir" up in the lower parts, lit may rightly be said that Downes' life was ' ound up with the preservation of the river, and the work of keeping it open as the most attraetive and useful inland waterway in Xew; Zealand.

Now that W. T. Downes no longer cruises and watches has beloved river. it is a question whether any strong guardianship will operate in hie place. The Wanganui is a far more valuable and useful river than most people [realise. Xot merely as a tourist route; it is a natural channel into the kiSM-t of the North Island; the road whici. cost nothing for uj4cecp until the pakeha, jcanic to gspoil it. Rivers are the ttuvt economical of roads: and they should l«e u*ed to the full. The Waikato is useful for navigation; it would be of greater use still if trouble were taken, to keep it* lower reaches from clogging sand. The problem of maintaining the Wan;ranui lies first in its upper reaches and its bead-trifcutariee, stripped of bush by timber companies and the operations of struggling settler* wb» should never have been placed there at all. The erosion of land which v 'becoming more serious every year is parliculeriy markc-d in the Wanganui river-

system. This ero?ion ha* keen a«ss£ted by % perfectly unnecessary road which Vμ made some year* ago up a3ong the steep east bank of tbe TVanganui a<: far a* Pipiriki. In it* making much bush w.ae idestroyed, and the bank wa«s ruined in many places; the road oontinuallr flipped away, and it is etill slipping 'after rain. It ronst have cost a Jot of [money for maintenance; tlie water-road ion that lower part of the river costs nothing. Snrh a river would he rightly I valued in any other country. It v of 'more value at le« co*t than many a iroad. an<l travel it i= infinitely Imoj-p plea««nt. But th«-e is always & icall for a road for motor travel, and in tlie road go<v at whatever cost. A river seems to he re{rard<*d sti eome quarter* a* merely a pretty feature of the landscape; it i? nit taken seriously a* anyIthin? e© utilitarian as a. commercial Iroad.