TWENTY SHILLINGS' WORTH

Evening Post, Volume CXI, Issue 121, 25 May 1931, Page 8

TWENTY SHILLINGS' WORTH

Development in ihe direction of improving roads, said the Commissioner of Transport in his^ address to the technological section of the Philosophical Society, should follow the principles of, an equitable' distribution of improved roads throughout the country, the programme of improvements being based on: (a) Traffic densities; (b) transport requirements of the area; (c) other transport facilities available. Unless these principles arc closely observed the taxpayer concerned ■will not get twenty shillings' worth of utility from every pound expended. Next to co-ordination of transport, the prime importance of which Mr. Hunter emphasised, a sound road construction policy is probably the most urgent requirement for economic transport in New Zealand. A sound policy does not necessarily mean higher expenditure. In some directions it will probably reduce costs; but it must be devised to work with and not against other transport factors. In the past the job has been half-done, and some of the results are: (1) Good main roads which expedite the carriage of passengers and such goods as can bear the charge; (2) roads parallel with the railways which encourage competition with the State-owned railway system, and, since motor traffic does not bear the full cost of the roads, subsidise this competition at the public expense; (3) relief for county ratepayers by motor taxation; (4) a greater burden on county ratepayers by additional cost of secondary county roads through motor traffic brought- to the county by good main roads. There are other results to which we have drawn attention previously, such as the anomaly of town-used vehicles paying taxes which go mainly towards the upkeep of out-of-town roads. The consequence is that the towns have not the additional revenue which they need to provide durable streets —one cause of the higher rates. The main needs of the present day to correct existing anomalies are: (1) an equitable road-lax so that road-transport pays for its permanent way (this is essential for an economic distribution of transport); (2) distribution of the tax proceeds so that the funds are paid where the motors run; (3) a radical adjustment of the county financing system, so that main roads will not absorb all revenue and leave nothing for the secondary roads. Concentration on main roads is now seen to be mistaken policy. Under pressure of adversity the country is realising the truth of the statement which Mr. Winston Churchill, when Chancellor of the Exchequer, applied to British transport policy: that we cannot af-. ford as a nation to render prematurely obsolescent a great railway enterprise. County ratepayers also are realising that there can be too much so-called "progress" in transport when they have to gpay for the roads. They have not yet recognised the true remedy, but having heard oi derating in Great Britain they seek to apply it here. Such application, without instituting a complete transport policy, would nitre!y shill: the cost and not lessen it. To avoid resort to such makeshift measures the Government should lose no lime, in presenting a thorough and well-con-sidered transport scheme.