FIFTY YEARS AGO

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXX, Issue 21548, 20 July 1933, Page 8

FIFTY YEARS AGO

EXTRACTS FROM THE HERALD HARBOUR BRIDGE PROJECT The following are extracts from the New Zealand Herald of July 20, 1883 "The idea of bridging the Waitemata is of such long growth that it may be considered to have arrived a maturity," says a correspondent. « we take a lesson from American works, costs need not be a stumbling block. We can span our harbour with a substantial timber structure at a cheap rate, quite sufficient to answer our present purpose; and it will not be the first wooden bridge that has preceded an iron one, which might be out of fashion for the next generation u we were to erect it now. The span between the high cliff at the starting point of the main North road at Birkenhead and the point at Ponsonby in a line with the Ponsonby Road could easily be done with timber from our forests at a cost of about one-fourtn of an iron structure. The first span would stretch across the deep channel running close along the cliff front and the sugar works, and could be constructed high enough to allow the largest vessels to pass underneath, ine advisability of the undertaking 13 obvious. The trunk line of roadway would be complete, and the lands where our principal forests abound would be connected with the chief port of the North Island." The following quantities of land have been set apart by Act in the province of Auckland for "promotion of higher education in such manner as the general Assembly may determine" :—Waikato, 20,000 acres; Opotiki, 10,000; Kaipara, 354; total, 30,354 acres.