OAMARU FORESHORE EROSION.

Evening Star, Issue 22684, 25 June 1937, Page 14

OAMARU FORESHORE EROSION.

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —I should like to congratulate “ Not An Engineer ” on the interest he is taking in the above-mentioned matter, as evidenced by his letter in your issue of 23rd inst., but would humbly suggest that unless there is a very firm foundation for the piles all the work suggested by him will be useless. In my opinion the cause of the whole trouble is the trapping of the shingle in the Waitaki River by the Waitaki hydro electric dam, and I think it would be more proIfitable to the Government and the people of Oamaru and Timam if this was blown up rather than have any more money wasted in groynes, piles, and the tipping of stone. The embargo on the talcing of sand and shingle from the seashore between Moeraky and north of Oamaru would, from a distant observer’s point of view, appear to be a joke. The northerly drift carries the shingle with it (it is common knowledge that Timaru had to extend its breakwater years ago to prevent the harbour from being blocked, and that a large portion of Timaru foreshore is made up wholly of shingle), and when supplies were stopped by the damming of the Waitaki, it looks for its supplies elsewhere. The Waitaki has scoured itself out, lowering its level at the intake of some of the water supplies, cleaned out portions of several farms, and is probably now down to bedrock. The northern drift will take its toll from Oamaru northwards, and only when it establishes and, as it were, settles down on a new coast line will the erosion cease. Therefore any attempt at Oamaru to stop the erosion will be useless unless the foundation is so solid as not to be carried away, too. —I am, etc., Interference. June 24.