SPECIAL CASE CAN BE MADE FOR URGENT GISBORNE-COAST PROBLEMS

Gisborne Herald, Volume LXXVII, Issue 23207, 20 March 1950, Page 4

SPECIAL CASE CAN BE MADE FOR URGENT GISBORNE-COAST PROBLEMS

HIGHWAYS BOARD’S VISIT

SUMMARIES of the Dominion’s financial commitments made,public by the Prime Minister and other spokesmen for the new Government during recent weeks have led to a general expectation that the State purse strings are to be pulled tighter in the coming financial year.

Among the activities which may be curtailed is the improvement of highways, and it is freely forecast that the general allocation for this purpose will be substantially lower than for the 1949-50 financial year. The changed circumstances will call for a special effort to ensure that belated recognition of this district’s communication problems is not obscured in the process of re-adjust-ment of internal expenditure from public funds.

Armed with the information pained during a four-day tour of the district, undertaken last week, members of No. 4 District HighMays Council should be able to present a positive case against curtailment of work on highways serving Gisborne and the East Coast.

Strong pressure exerted by public bodies and organisations succeeded, during the past two years, in winning from the former Minister of Works an undertaking that this district would receive better treatment in the matter of highways communications. The construction season now drawing to a close has reflected that undertaking in a programme of works overshadowing anything previously attempted for the district. Backward Position Persists

It would be a severe setback to progress in one of the principal farming districts of the Dominion if tiie programme were not carried on to its natural conclusion.

The Gisborne-Whakatano, via Waioeka, route has been improved materially in recent years, but (here remains a great deal to be done before this highway approximates to the most limited standards found in more favoured districts. What has been accomplished, indeed, serves to point up by strong contrast the backyard state of many portions of the route. Waioeka "Conditioning” For Board. Trafl'ord's Hill, once the bugbear of traffic, is now a motorist’s joy-ride. Its broad, well-kept surfaces and wideradius curves show what can be done to overcome natural obstacles to communication. They serve also to draw attention to the unimproved portion of the Waioeka Gorge road, where traffic winds on a tortuous course for many miles, with poor surfaces and limited visibility. It is a good road by the standards of 1925,

The Main Highways Board will visit tiie district during this week, and will hear, doubtless, strong representations in respect of various items of work which are regarded by local authorities as urgent.

There may be some danger that a welter of local representations will obscure the main issue to tie argued—the special case for consideration by the Government and the Main Highways Board arising from the district’s

generally backward position in regard to communications.

The general policy of the Main Highways Board, as stated on many occasions, is to take up each year a programme of work from (he point at which the previous year's work concluded. Gisborne deputations have been put off time and again, in respect of requests for district improvements, by the argument that the board’s work cannot be done piecemeal, but must follow a logical course of development. The principle is unarguable, but there has been plenty of ground for believing that this district's essential needs have been set back repeatedly while huge sums have been expended in refinements of good highways systems elsewhere. Ihistlcss Surface to Napier

The years of waiting have borne this fruit —that at least there is tangible recognition of (he need for an allweather dustless highway connecting Gisborne with Napier. If the progress made south of Gisborne in the current year is maintained, this goal will be attained during the next, two seasons. The district will Rive credit to the board and its agencies for an excellent season's work in 1049-50; but it cannot afford to relax pressure on behalf of other routes out of Gisborne. Communications to the northward are still lied fairly closely (o the horpe-nnd-buggy days. On the GisborncOpotiki. via East Cape, route,' winter traffic is still subject to suspension for various reasons which fall within the board's sphere of control. Not only are there open water-courses still unbridged, but there are many points at which flooding of streams reacts upon the condition of highways surfaces. Motor travel between Gisborne and Opotiki on this route is sfill a businsss of fits and starts, with slow motion sections interspersed freely among highspeed portions of the highway.

The need for improvement to the north is emphasised by the lack of alternative means of surface travel in that direction. The sealed-highway undertaking to the south now reaching fulfilment is of inestimable value to motor traffic even though it dees traverse districts also served by rail. To the northward passengers and freight must travel by highway or by air, and the “air anri is not equipped to deal with the whole burden of traffic. It can be assumed that when the Main Highways Board reaches Gisborne, travelling by the Waioeka route, its members will be thoroughly conditioned to hear suggestions for its improvement. It is safe, likewise, to forecast that the district highways council and local authorities will not miss the chance to strike while the iron is hot. The outlets to the north will be the subject of representation from various quarters, and the arguments available should be difficult to refute. I’oor Surface Near Gisborne The environs of Gisborne provide several examples of outdated highways, laid down in earlier years on the assumption that half a loaf is better than no bread. Many of them have narrow strip of scaling and wavy surfaces, reminiscent of the days of early Taranaki road-sealing when it was considered good practice to space bumps in order to keep down the speed of motor traffic.

These are not highways in the modern sense. They need reconstruction in the form of widening of the seal-coat and an ironing-out of surfaces. At the least, they should provide for two vehicles to pass without either being forced off the scaling. Whether this work can be done concurrently with a speedy extension of country work on highways improvement may be questioned but the Main Highways Board should not lie allowed to forget what is due to a district where motor transport is becoming more and more an adjunct to primary production.

Nor should local bodies be content any longer to accept without argument the principle that traffic density must rule the allocations of highways funds. An irrefutable argument could be put forward on the principle that districts which produce huge quantities of exportable food and raw materials do more for the national economy than those which owe a great deal of their traffic density to secondary-industry development: and that any factors which retard primary production rob the nation as a whole.