IMPROVING STATE HIGHWAYS

Press, Volume LXXIV, Issue 22319, 5 February 1938, Page 10

IMPROVING STATE HIGHWAYS

* PROPOSALS SUBJECTED TO CLOSE SCRUTINY COMMENT BY CHAIRMAN OF BOARD tFEESS ASSOCIATION TELEGRAM.) WELLINGTON. February 4. The Main Highways Board has just completed a visit to the Wanganui, Taranaki, King Country, Bay of Plenty, and South Waikato districts. More than 60 conferences were held with local bodies. Interviewed to-day, the chairman (Mr J. Wood), said it was three years since the board last visited these districts, and improvements carried out were very marked. Some criticism had been made about the extensive improvements in hand on the various State highways system and it was found that local opinion did not appreciate the fact that approximately 70 per cent, of rural traffic was confined to State highways. Measures sponsored by the Road Safety Council for improving conditions so as to reduce the possibility of accidents were explained by the board, in justification of the policy of realigning parts of the highways where visibility and curvature were considerably below the standard necessary to carry the traffic now using the roads. Every detail of improvements was subjected to a close engineering investigation before the final proposal was adopted, and experience had shown that in many instances a bold scheme of reconstruction was more economical than a modified scheme. As far as possible reconstruction was planned with due regard to further traffic development in the light of traffic censuses.