The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. MONDAY, MAY 11, 1914. THE ROADS PROBLEM.

Stratford Evening Post, Volume XXXIX, Issue 17, 11 May 1914, Page 4

The Stratford Evening Post WITH WHICH IS INCORPORATED THE EGMONT SETTLER. MONDAY, MAY 11, 1914. THE ROADS PROBLEM.

That problem of ever-growing urgency and importance—tho maintenance of our roads—is engaging much attention again both in public places and in the Proas of the Dominion, In connection with Wellington City’s latest loan proposals tho Wellington “Post” points out that out of a sum of £222,000 it is proposed to raise, £170,000 is required for tho construction of now roads to suburbs and a traffic tunnel to giro easier access to a growing part of tho city, while nearly £70,000 ia wanted for providing a bettor surface for city thoroughfares, which have to carry *u increasingly heavy traffic. Tiio same needs are being felt in the country, and, as our contemporary remarks, the old macadam roads are rapidly breaking down under tho strain of high-speed motor traffic, Backblocks uninstalled roads are proving entirely inadequate to the growth of settlement. Those facts have been impressed upon Ministers in the course of thciir peregrinations through tho country with a unanimity quite unprecedented. It is quite true that the settlors iu the back country want roads and will not bo put off any longer; tho farmers in the older districts are appreciating the heavy burden of tho upkeep of main arterial roads and want tho Government to take them over, but whether this would ho the wisest step is i matter for difference of opinion, Tho “Post” dealing further with this most important question says; For this enhanced wear and tear on reads the tremendous expansion of motor traffic iu recent years is chiefly responsible, and if speaks well for the social conscience of tbs motorists that they admit it, and, through (be president of the Auto-

mobile Union, have exprosed a williuguuww to pay their bharo by way oi' wpeciul tax, This has already been carried out for some years in the Old Country, whore the ear-tax and the petrol-tax have both been devoted to thq subsidising of local bodies for the improvement of roads, with the result that to day, in spite of an enormous motor traffic, English roads are probably the best in the world. America, too, is waking up, and the various States are spending hundreds of millions of dollars in improving their roads. They find it pays fo have good roads. . . The main highways in

America are now being built of concrete, which may be expensive"to lay clown in the first cost, but requires a minimum of maintenance. It was thus the Homans built their paved roads which have lasted until to-day. . . . The Prime Minister lias tentatively suggested a big loan for roadmaking throughout the Dominion. The idea is well worthy of consideration. A country is a business concern as much as a city or a private enterprise. If the money spent on roads is well spent it will easily bo returned in the cheapening of transport, in the ease of communication, in the popularisation of settlement, and in the checking of the rural drift to the city through the enhancement of'the attractions of the country. The scope of the blessings of good roads with the advantages of modern high speed motor transport is almost boundless. It brings the city to the country and the country to the city. It makes the lot of families in the remoter backblocks worth while, for it gives them access to civilisation at all times of the year. Hoads are the arteries and veins of the social system of a country, and if those means of circulation are blocked or choked, then the part affected must languish. The construction and maintenance of roads, railways, and bridges in a country like this should be tbo first consideration of the State, But there is one proviso. The money spent on roads must be well spent. If it is spent politically, as it has been so often in the past, as useless roads and railways in various parts of the Dominion too well show, thou it is

money wasted. . . The Government should go into the matter very carefully with the idea of finding a basis for permanent work.