OPENING UP THE SOUNDS

New Zealand Herald, Volume LXXI, Issue 21763, 31 March 1934, Page 15

OPENING UP THE SOUNDS

SOUTH ISLAND SCHEME AMBITION OF MINISTER P ■ - COSTLY UNDERTAKINGS [by telegram OWN correspondent] CHRISTCHUECH, Thursday The scheme favoured by the Minister in charge of the Tourist Department, the Hon. Adam Hamilton, for opening up the sounds and southern part of the West Coast to tourist traffic from overseas and from the North is still being investigated by the Public Works Department, and Mr. Hamilton hopes to reoeive shortly a comprehensive report on its practicability. In an interview, Mr. Hamilton said that he stiH hoped to see his dreams realised. It would be costly to build the roads he had in mind, but he was sure they would prove of great advantage to the South Island and to the country as a whole. The first scheme, tho completion of tho Te Anau-Milford Sound road up tho Hollyford Valley and by tunnel through the Gertrude Saddle, was definitely within the range of possibility. Mr. Hamilton said that he had hopes of pushing on this work if funds permitted and if reports from tho district were favourable. Mr. John Wood, assistant-engineer to the Public Works Department, was at present in the Milford region in company with a party of surveyors who had for tho last three or four months been planning the tunnel road, and Mr. Hamilton expected a report from tho men in the near future. The second scheme, the construction of a road down the Hollyford Valley to the West Coast, and up the coast to Hokitika, was a more ambitious project, but it appeared to be quite practicable. When Mr. Wood and Mr. T. M. Ball, of the Public Works Department at Dunedin, made their flight over this region early in the month they had found little to prevent the building of such a road, either along the coast itself or further inland. Mr. Hamilton said that the engineers had made a comprehensive survey of the district from the air, flying low over the trees in some parts. No full report had yet been made on the subject, however, and Mr. Hamilton was hoping to get in touch with Mr. Wood in the South.