TAITA GORGE ROAD

Evening Post, Volume CXXXI, Issue 39, 15 February 1941, Page 13

TAITA GORGE ROAD

TRAFFIC SUSPENDED

' DANGEROUS EROSION

The effects of the flood in the Hutt Valley are much greater than was apparent yesterday. At Belmont Mr. R. W. Jones's house,".which was reported yesterday to be only nine -feet from the water, is now partially undermined, so that one corner overhangs, the river. Twenty or thirty feet of land, on which trees and shrubs were growing, north of this corner, has been completely eroded, and this morning the Water was still eating into the bank. With the assistance of Hutt River Board employees, the house was emptied this morning.

Another serious erosion is in the Taita Gorge, about half a mile south of the new concrete' bridge. Some years'ago serious erosion took place a few chains north of Stokes Valley, and a retaining wall was built. The present trouble has occurred about half a mile north of this point, where the current, thrown off the western bank by a bend in the river on the golf links, strikes the eastern bank. Here an area a chain long and from ten to fifteen feet wide has been washed away, reducing the roadway to single track width. Cracks in. the bank both north and south show that more ground may slip away at any moment. The drop from the road into the river is about 15 feet. Three telegraph poles have been left standing more or less in the river and others to the south are in a dangerous position.- A gang of P. and T. employees was busy this morning shifting the endangered poles to the other side of the road.'

. The hillside bank at the other side of the road alsa appears td be insecure.

So far the Public Works' Department has been too busy elsewhere to give this road any attention. The narrow track- left on the road is very dangerous, and the road has therefore been definitely closed to traffic, which is diverted to the Western Hutt Road.

Just below the concrete bridge, on the eastern side, where erosion took place shortly; aftei She. bridge was ', —■ ■■*•*■-■

built, it is again going on, and the road line is being encroached upon.

Along the Hutt Road north of Ngahauranga several minor slips fell yesterday, and the road was badly flooded through a.blocked culvert causing the flow of water off the hill to spread over the inner portion of the road. Traffic was' transferred to the outer track till the matter was remedied.

The work of clearing the slips along the Western Hutt Road is proceeding rapidly. The largest one is about half a mile south of the concrete bridge. The road is open for traffic.

The Akatarawa Road was reopened yesterday.