SLOW TRAFFIC ON NORTH ROAD

Press, Volume XCIV, Issue 28133, 23 November 1956, Page 12

SLOW TRAFFIC ON NORTH ROAD

USE OF PATROLS SUGGESTED

The Automobile Association (Canterbury) is again interesting itself in the relief o2 traffic congestion in the Main North road in the vicinity of the Waimakariri bridge. The Transport Department will be “respectfully asked” .to assign motorcycle patrols to the area at periods of peak traffic so that these more mobile officers may draw slow-moving vehicles to the side of the road, even if they have to run on the shingle shoulders.

At a meeting of the association s council last evening Mr L. W. Broadhead said that last Sunday he took a quarter of an hour to travel from Kaiapoi to the bridge “at a speed of eight miles an hour between hold- « ups.” The trouble was the slow driver. Traffic officers did try to wave motorists on but mobile patrols were needed to get slow drivers out of the main line of traffic.

The normal flow of traffic over the bridge was about 4000 vehicles a day, but peaks could amount to 16,000. said Mr F. W. Freeman. When the bridge was built he had urged provision for widening. Now cantilevers would cost more than the bridge. Reading authorities were now considering duplication of the traffic bridge and perhaps the construction of a new motorway to bypass many of the townships in the area.

If the highway between Woodend and Chaneys corner was sealed over its full width, slow drivers could have their own outer lanes and that would remove a lot of the trouble less expensively, said Mr W. R. Carey. Mr C. H. Browne said the association should continue pressure for a permanent solution but in the meantime motor-cycle patrols to pick out the slow drivers would be the most effective remedy.