PROPOSED WAINUI SADDLE ROAD.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 3, Issue 289, 25 April 1879, Page 2

PROPOSED WAINUI SADDLE ROAD.

To the Editor of the Akaroa Mail,

Sir, — Through the medium of your valuable paper, I wish to draw the attention of those ratepayers in" this road district, but who are outside of that small portion known as Wainui proper, to the mpdest request the ratepayers of Wainui: put forward. In your report of the sayings and doings of the Akaroa and Wainui Road Board of April 12, Mr M'Donald urges the claim of these ten or twelve ratepayers to: another road to give them access to the Plains,"but ho carefully avoids giving his' colleagues; any idea of cost of. construction _or .co.m-' pensation for the same. Now, Sir, I will give a rough estimate. Survey and grading—£lso. The proposed road being,, through private property; and a great portion Crown grantsd, the surveys must be very exact. I will take the Mount Bossu road as a basis for compensation. Assuming the road to be about three miles, it will cost, with fencing, -about £850; bush clearing and forming' a 10 foot track, £750; making a grand total of £1750, and I feel certain I am within the real cost should the Road Board put the work in hand. Now, Sir, this is what I wish the ratepayers who are not interested in Mr M'Donald's proposition to consider. The Wainui Riding has three roads already; viz., Mount Bossu, Little River, and the old Pigeon Bay road ; i.e., one road at either end and the other. almost through the middle of their district, and also that the French Farm road is surveyed to the summit to meet the Okute road, and the Road Board are pledged to make it; so that Wainui will have four roads for access to the Plains. Therefore, I think that some of the many by-roads are entitled to the first consideration of the Road Board, so as to enable the old settlers who • have neither water or road access to get their produce to market without packing it at such great cost and risk. And in conclusion, Sir, I feel the back settlers have been too reticent in putting forward their claims, but I now warn them if they allow Mr M'Donald'sproposition to be carried out it will absorb the greater part of the Road Board funds, and that the time is not far distant when a special rate will be levied to make new roads. Consequently they will have to compete in trade at a great disadvantage or will have to make their own roads. Yours &c, RATEPAYER.