RONGOTEA.

Feilding Star, Volume I, Issue 219, 19 March 1907, Page 2

RONGOTEA.

(Our Own Correspondent.) The end of the best summer season for many years has come at last, the last few days being very wet and cold. As usual our local bodies are all behind with the various works iv this part of the county. It some-. . what puzzles ratepayers who are not in the know why roads like the road from Sandon to Foxton and around Sandon and Carnarvon can be kept in good order and be well metalled in the early part of the season, while the roads around Rongotea aud Glen Oroua are left in a shocking state till the heavy rains I come. Then they get a sprinkling of boulders, and the plea is raised that it is too late to metal till the roads are drier, and the settlers in this highly-valued and closely-settled district can flounder along for another season while the other parts of tiie county have eood and well-kept roads. Take the main road from Rongotea to Oroua Bridge as an example of the whole of this end of the county. True, a few loads have been sprinkled at the bridge end, and a few at Rongotea, but the holes near Glen Oroua would bury a yard in each of them, and if left alone will practically close the road for the whole of the winter. It often strikes me that those at the head of the county want to run the working end of the county on the oheap, and ultimately this will be found the most expensive way. Take the roadmen: They have from six miles upwards to keep in order, provide their own tools, horse, saddle and bridle, for less wages than an ord£ nary laborer*, and this when good navvies are getting 10s a day. Then, to save an engineer's salary, we have a working foreman, an excellent man vi his line and good value for his pay, still he is expected to be an exexpert in bridge-work. I don't know if he is responsible for it, but why are the new bridges near Feilding being decked with timber P They are strong enough for a railway, so far as the iron girders go. Then why not have a concrete decking, which, would last for a century, while the totara decking is always a source of expense, and such as no practical engineer would think of using in snch a case. What I stated in my notes some weeks ago has now come to pass: Owing to our Drainage Boards letting their drain-cleaning late in the season, not hajf of them are finished, and now the rains will probably prevent the work heing. done this season. There is no doubt that this drainage matter is the biggest thing in our midst at present, and although it is shelved: year after year, it must be taken up in a bold and systematic manner before long. The lands of this Oroua Valley are of too gieat value to stand the loss sustained by periodic floods. Not, that they damage the land itself, rather the rich deposit improves them, but with land at £30 an acre, and scarcely procurable at that, the water question must, and I am sure will be attended to. If the valuator for the district would only put the same values on the large estates as he does on the small ones adjoining • diainage and closer settlement would soon follow. The progress of the Glen Oroua district in particular during the last six years is a great surprise to those who can look back. Once you could count all the dwellings in sight on one hand. Now there are over thirty in a similar radius, and the number is being constantly added to. Land that was then considered dear at £16, is now changing hands at £26, without improvements. Land the Government would not take at, £l7 an acre, is now selling at £32 j and when one sees what is taken off it, it is the cheapest land in the colony. Let anyone who is sceptical visit Mr Scott's or Mr Mabey's farms;, or count the stock on Mr C. Hopping* 8 farm,, and they will be more astonished than they will be at reading this. I understand that Mr Hopping has disposed of two more of his farm sections, and only the homestead n">w remains. This practically closes the lands for sale in this district. Most of the farmers even refuse to name a price when asked to sell. Settlers in the Glen Oroua and Oroua Bridge districts are put to a great deal of trouble owing to the want of one of the Great Unpaid. They must needs travel to Pahnerston or Feilding if a J.P. is required. The removal of the sawmill from Oroua Bridge practically closes tiie sawmill business in this county. No . more small clumps remain now.