The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. THURSDAY, MARCH 2O, 1913. YESTERDAY’S LOAN POLL.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXV, Issue 63, 20 March 1913, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post. WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. THURSDAY, MARCH 20, 1913. YESTERDAY’S LOAN POLL.

The loan proposals placed before the ratepayers of Stratford at yesterday’s poll were all rejected by substantial majorities, and even waterworks improvement and drainage extension proved unacceptable in the form put. That all the work done by the Mayor and Council during the past year should have been wasted is matter for regret, and we shall not be at all surprised if the decision given at yesterday’s poll is accepted, to some extent, as one of no-confidence. That the scheme as a whole, to borrow £42,000, was too ambitious it is very generally admitted, but there were also many adverse circumstances and many cross-currents of feeling, which would have tended to negative any proposal whatever. That the people of Stratford are quite opposed to reasonable borrowing for necessary works and improvements within the Borough must by no means be taken from the result of yesterday’s polling, because for two years past the'general opinion has been that a loan of from £15,000 to £20.000 for waterworks improvement and general improvement to streets, has been both desirable and necessary and will have to 1)0 secured before very long. The general tightness of the money market at this time doubtless had something to do with the attitude taken up, but the principal cause of failure to carry the proposals must be ascribed to the fact that the total sum asked for was larger than ratepayers were prepared to authorise. What the next move of the Council will be remains to be seen. The question of cutting the Borough into special rating areas is not a new one, but in view of the happenings of yesterday might well be reconsidered and further discussed. The lessening of area would give greater community of interest, and if some work materially affecting one portion of the town were strongly desired by the ratepayers they would have the opportunity of obtaining it without asking fellow-ratepayers, not in any way interested, to share the burden.

TH K STR AT FORD-ON G A RUE LINE. The Public Works Department is inviting tenders for the construction of the tunnel and the adjacent piece of line on the Stratford-Ongarue railway tunnel, which will pierce a bill n a very difficult piece of country at ’.he eastern end, about four miles f'om Main Trunk, and will provide a key lo communication between the fertile Ohura Valley and the outside world. The tunnel will bo about a mile long.

and the piece of lino to he binit a. mile and a half over very broken country, requiring a remarkable zigzag route to bo adopted for the line. At the northern end work i.s now going on steadily and an Auckland “Star” correspondent states that about a hundred men are now engaged on the work there. The chief operations on the line at present are making cuttings and forming embankments. The great bank leading from the side of the hill towards the site of the future bridge over the On- ( game river is growing day by day. The bridge will apparently be at a highj level. The service road which crosses ' the ridge into the Ohura, roughly i parallel with the railway route, is now completely formed and partly metalled. Twenty-four chains of it have been treated with burnt papa, which, before it is fired, is of a blueslatey colour, and afterwards resembles red brick. During the cutting of tho road a seam of shell-rock 16ft. thick, similar in appearance to a quartz reef, was discovered, and this has been utilised for metalling a miloj and a half of the road. Jt is intend-j ed to metal the remainder, as pumice, however good for a makeshift, has not tho wearing quality of metal, and wherever the latter is procurable it pays in the long run to use it. Testing the river bed for suitable foundations for the bridge is now being carried out. Thus tin’s important I work progresses from each end.