MAIN HIGHWAYS

Evening Post, Volume CX, Issue 31, 5 August 1925, Page 11

MAIN HIGHWAYS

SOUTH ISLAND DISSATISFIED "TOO BIG A JOB FOB, ONE BOARD." (BI TELEQRAPa.—PBESS' ASSOCIATION.) CHRISTCHURCH, 4th August. The county councils of the South Island, to judge by those in Canterbury, are not satisfied with the operations of the Main Highways Act, so to-day re- i presentatives of the councils in highway • groups 13, 14, and 15 were called to- — gether in conference by the Canterbury Progress League to talk questions over. There were 65 delegates, and' Messrs. F. W. Furkert (chairman of the Main Highways Board), F. Langbein (district engineer and chairman of the highways groups), and J,. D. Bruce (counties' representative tin the Main Highways Board) were also present. Mr. W. K. M'Alpine said that the main dissatisfaction was because there was only one board, the councils were bound down, and there was not enough elasticity. The South Island was unanimous for a board for each island. There was no complaint with anything else, but it was too big a job- for on? board to administer the Act in both islands. In Canterbury the roads were made without Government assistance, but a' new class of traffic had come along that the councils could cope with The councils were not prepared to- go on increasing the rates just for one section'of the motoring public. Mr. Furkert said that if the delegates had waited for the report of the recent conference to be disseminated the money spent in bringing the delegates together would not have been wasted. Members: "We paid our own expenses." Mr. Furkert: "I am not concerned with who paid it. The report, I think, would show you that a lot of your troubles will be eliminated." The conference decided to re- . commend the Government to alter the maintenance subsidy from £1 to £2 to £1 for £1, not because it was thought the best thing, but because of the state of the finances. Not one of the South Island representatives at tha Conference suggested a board for the South Island. Motions were carried in favour of the subsidy for construction and maintenance being not less than 50 per cent., and that revenue received under the Act be apportioned between the two islands in proportion to the number of motor vehicles in use in each island. Mr. Bruce said that the board had passed a resolution that all the money raised in the South Island must be spent in that island. He did not want _ to press the South Island to borrow at, the rate of the North Island, for he g thought that in the North Island this was being ,pverdone. There were at pre- "1 sent twelve amendments to the Act before the House, the nature of which J he could not divulja to the conference, but he could inform it that there was little doubt that a £1 for £1 subsidy for maintenance purposes would be soon forthcoming.