STEEL WORKS

Northern Advocate, 15 September 1934, Page 8

STEEL WORKS

POSSIBILITY AT WHANG ARE I. SITE TO BE CONSIDERED. PORT ROAD QUESTION. The chairman of the . Whangarei Harbour Board, Mr J. Av Finlayson, stated yesterday afternoon, at the meeting with the Whangarei County Council to consider the matter of the Kioreroa road, that he had received a letter indicating that Whangarei would be definitely considered as a site for the proposed steel works for the Dominion.

At present a site in Dunedin is being investigated. Mr Finlayson pointed out that if there was no road to the wharf, it would be useless for a site for such works.

Later in the meeting, Mr L. Webb, chairman of the County Council, said that the possibility of works starting in Whangarei had been heard of before, but they were all very much in the air.

Mr J. A. S. Mac Kay did not think a large expenditure on a road was justified just because a works had been mentioned. Similar enterprises had been mentioned before, and they might have a road built and have very little use for it.

The statement that Whangarei would be considered as a possible site for the establishment of steel works in the Dominion, was commented upon this morning by a Whangarei business man, who expressed the opinion that Whangarei would be an ideally situated locality. The fact that there were large coal and limestone deposits was a strong factor in favour of Whangarei, and another point was that the harbour was more in line with overseas trade routes than Dunedin, which had been mentioned as the site to be selected. Dunedin was well off the overseas route, and would necessitate a long additional journey by steamers.