The Times. TUESDAY, APRIL 5, 1938. Whirokino Deviation

Manawatu Times, Volume 63, Issue 80, 5 April 1938, Page 6

The Times. TUESDAY, APRIL 5, 1938. Whirokino Deviation

01 all the national highway projects at present being prosecuted in the Dominion the deviation at Whirokino will confer the greatest benefit to users of the road in the Wellington province and the Manawatu in particular. Undertaken as a task of national importance, the raising of the road level across the peat swamp between Foxton and the Manawatu river will remove the menace of flood water from the Welling-ton-Auekland west coast highway and remedy a situation which in the past has been a source of considerable dissatisfaction.

The magnitude of the re-construction programme that has been steadily going forward for some considerable time is clearly indicated in a special page ill “The Times’’ to-day, which gives an interesting summary of the position at present. The difficulties that were faced by the engineers who were set the task of constructing an all-weather route over a highway that had proved an expensive proposition to maintain were of an unusual nature.

For years the surface of the old macadam road had suffered from the increasingly heavy traffic because of the unstable foundation provided by the deep layer of peat. This, combined with the ever-present threat of blockage through the overflow of flood waters from the nearby river, provided a problem that has now been solved by a long, high embankment and a trestle bridge 3600 feet in length which, between them, will enable motor traffic to pass in perfect safety even in the heaviest flood.

The cost of the whole scheme will be high, but when allowance is made for the unusually large cost of keeping the old road in repair and the fact that in any event the time was not far distant when a new bridge would have to be built to replace the one over the Manawatu- river, the expenditure is more easily justified.

New Zealand’s main highways are everywhere being brought to a higher standard, and the improvements being effected at Whirokino will be a valuable contribution to the Dominion road system.