£26,000,000 FOR ROADS

Poverty Bay Herald, Volume LXV, Issue 19808, 9 December 1938, Page 2

£26,000,000 FOR ROADS

MAIN HIGHWAYS BOARD EXPENDITURE SIN Cl'] .1922 INTEREST IN BEAUTY Since the establishment of the Main Highways Board in 1922 the income ci the board had totalled about £26,000,000 and the expenditure, about the same, according to a statement made by Mr. C. J. Talbot, a member ol the board, at the quarterly meeting of the South Island Motor Union, held in Greymouth.

Included in the total of the income, Mr. Talbot said, were £5,000,000 from registration fees, £2,000,000 from tyre tax, £11,000,000 from petrol tax. and £7,000,000 loan money, and expenditure included £20,000,000 on roads, £2,500,000 on loan charges, and £1,500,000 on subsidies, rebates, etc. In his opinion the money spent had been well spent, and new the board cared for 12,000 miles of roads at a cost of about; £IOO a mile. To-day the work of maintaining State highways was more thoroughly done than when entrusted to local bodies.

The beard was always taking steps to eliminate one-way bridges and recently had taken up important work acquiring land for widening existing roads npar thickly-populated areas, work which would prevent chaos in later years.

According to the latest census, Mr. Talbot said, in the last three years traffic had increased on the average of 50 per cent, and in some cases by from 300 to 350 per cent. Also, the board had spent £400,000 eliminating railway level crossings. “I would like to see the board take an interest in beauty spots on the highways,” Mr. C. M. Rout (Nelson), said. "They arc being waded into by power boards. It seems nobody's job to watch them. The Post and Telegraph Department has had to be prevented destroying beauty spots. There is nothing a power board

oi' nublic works man likes better than to get his axe into a tree.” Mr. Talbot said he agreed with the need for the preservation of such spots, and as far as possible the board was doing its part.