MORE INSPECTORS

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 153, 26 December 1936, Page 12

MORE INSPECTORS

HIGHWAY SUPERVISION

METROPOLITAN AUTHORITY?

ACCIDENT CAUSES

One of the salient facts of the increase in holiday traffic on roads outside Wellington during the Christmas Eve period this year is that the number of main highways inspectors on duty was quite .inadequate. The rush apparently caught the authorities in the midst of preparations which had n.ot been completed. It is necessary that new inspectors should be fully trained in the control of traffic before being put on, and this takes time. These and other facts were emphasised today to a "Post" reporter in an interview with Mr. E. H. Barrett, until recently Chief Inspector of the Transport Department, and now Supervisor of Main Highways Inspectors. '" "We will, when all the men are put on," said Mr. Barrett, "have one chief inspector in all the four centres, who will have ten men under him, but we could not obtain sufficient qualified men before the holidays. For the districts out of Wellington there were myself, as chief traffic inspector, controlling the district from Ngahauranga to Pahautanui, Inspector P. C. Watson, who had arrived from Invercargill to take up his duties, and who controlled the traffic from Petone to the top of the'Rimutakas, and Inspector J. E. Ainsworth, who controlled I the traffic from Pahautanui to Otaki. Mr. Barrett attributed the freedom of his section from accident partly to the fact that his car carried a loudj speaker. ALL-NIGHT DRIVERS. "I agree with the secretary of the Automobile Association," continued Mr. Barrett, "that the cars that were leaving the city were greatly overloaded, which tilted their lights off the road. A surprising number of the lights were defective. Some cars had only one headlight, and some no rear light, while the condition of the lights of many of the cars showed that they had not been on the roads for weeks. I was greatly struck by the number of people who. left Wellington after 10 p.m. with the intention of driving all night. There is no doubt that it is the desire to cover long distances in a short time after putting in a full day's work that is the cause of some accidents. I stopped quite a few cars between Ngahauranga and Pahautanui, and I was surprised at the distances some of them intended to cover that night, such as to Egmont hostel, New. Plymouth, and making for Te Kuiti, all leaving after 10 p.m., and some later, with the intention of doing nonstop runs. "Another thing is that the tendency in present-day camping seems to be to load half the house 'on the car. Many of the baby type of cars were hopelessly loaded up, and I saw one motox'-cycle on which the front number plate was completely hidden by a pile of gear, while the back was piled high also. This man was riding solo. While trailers are not so desirable in city traffic, I would much prefer to see trailers used on the' country highways than to see cars so overloaded. COMING ORGANISATION. "When we are organised there will be men at Palmerston North, Levin, Martpn, Dannevirke, Wanganui,' and Masterton. "There are men dealing with traffic in those neighbourhoods now, but they are not being controlled by the Main Highways Board, but by the local bodies./ Traffic inspectors should be on the roads all the time during the holidays, as far as is possible, but local body inspectors, are only obliged to observe what are practically office hours. As the traffic eased off from only about 2 a.m. on Christmas Day, it will be seen how impossible it was for one man on each of our three sections, when the roads are so congested, to carry out his duties effectively. There was a weakness in control between Otaki and Palmerston North. Drivers who wish to travel dangerously are under such conditions given every, opportunity to do so, and it is also impossible for one man to halt and check up on those employers who put their men on the roads at night after they have been driving all day. "The new, high-powered, practically silent cars, placed oh the roads where there are still old cars of quite a serviceable type capable of only half the speed, and giving plenty of warning to the driver when safe speeds are exceeded, mean a good deal of overtaking and passing, and with the drivers of many of the new cars it is a case of 'the driving of an 80-mile car by a 20-mile driver on a 30-mile road,' as it has been put in America. Quite a number of drivers in these cars do not know how fast they are going. We devoted our attentions to those who were driving dangerously or foolishly, stopped many of them, and pointed out their mistakes." SUGGESTED NEW BODY. One who has had some experience of traffic control gave it as his opinion today that the time had come when there should be a metropolitan traffic authority, embracing not only the city, but also all .the contiguous closelypopulated areas. This would enable an additional staff to be put on, and, if necessary at holiday times, a twenty-four-hour patrol. He pointed out that most of the accidents occurred after midnight, in the case of people who were trying to make up time. The body suggested would, he said, avoid the multiform control at present existing. In these days a motor-car did not necessarily do most of its travel in the district in which it was registered. There were in Petone and Lower Hutt 95 per cent, of cars which did most of their travel to and in the city. At present there were only three local body traffic men in Lower Hutt, Petone, and Eastbourne, and each of the three had only a bicycle. They were inspectors of health, sanitation, building, noxious weeds, etc., as well as attempting to deal with motor traffic. For each of these men the traffic inspection should be a full-time job, and with a motor-car for their- sole use. The authority he had in mind should be comprised of representatives, including the Wellington City Council, Eastbourne, Petone, and Lower Hutt Boroughs, and the Johnsonville Town Board. The above suggestion certainly gives food for thought when it is remembered that Wellington had 23 inspectors, its full staff, on duty on Christmas' Eve, and that: Auckland, with a smaller actual city area, employs 44. It is clear that the demarcation of city limits under the authority suggested would free highway inspectors of some of the most congested portions of their roads.