THE SECOND TUNNEL

Evening Post, Volume CIX, Issue 121, 26 May 1925, Page 8

THE SECOND TUNNEL

ELLICE STREET AND RIXON

GROVE

HATAITAI ASSOCIATION ON

WARPATH.

"Interest in the proposed eastern suburbs' traffic tunnel has not been allowed to wane during the past twelve months," states the annual report of the Hataitai Municipal Electors' Association, "but the net result of representations, oral and verbal, finds us in exactly the same state of bewildering uncertainty as obtained when our last report was presented. From the meagre crumbs of information which are allowed to unobtrusively fall from the council's intellectual table, the only sustenance derived is the fact that, officially, the route will be via Ellice street. To date no satisfactory evidence ha 3 been offered to the citizens of Wellington that the Elizabeth street-Rixon grove route has been properly examined by qualified engineers who are competent to express au unbiased opinion—such opinion being based on the economic principle of the greatest good for the, greatest number. '

"We understand that there has been a suggestion recently that the council's staff should confer with outside authorities on this important matter, and it is sincerely hoped that the members of the recently-elected City Council will countenance this common-sense procedure. "It is universally acknowledged that the existing tunnel piercing the Mount Victoria range is an expensive monument to the deplorable lack of vision of a previous council, and to the majority of residents on the eastern side of the city it seems that a scheme which envisages an approach of majestic width, converging into a 'bottle-neck' tunnel carrying two-way trams, vehicular, and pedestrian traffic is merely perpetuating the previous blunder and piling up future trouble for a long-suffering section of the community. The commercial centre of a city is primarily, based on its railways and wharves, and if this be accepted, then it naturally follows that to prevent congestion the traffic to and from the waterfront should b e diverted from city thoroughfares at the. nearest available point, and not be compelled to traverse crowded streets. TRAM EXTENSION. "The proposed tramway extension, via Waipapa road, has been scrapped in favour of a motor-bus service. It is understood that the council proposes to commission one vehicle, which will ply from the Waitoa road loopline to the Roseneath Pire Station. Representa•tions have been. made that in oiuopinion one bus is insufficient for the needs of this thickly-populated district."