LONG BAY ROAD.

Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume 4, Issue 336, 7 October 1879, Page 2

LONG BAY ROAD.

To the Editor of the Akaroa Mail.

Mr Editor, —I should like to ask the Road Board, through the medium of your paper, whether the Long Bay road, especially the upper portion, has been passed ; if so, my opinion is that the overseer, or who ever the Board has appointed to look over the work, must have gone over it with their eyes shut, as it is patent to any one that may travel it that the contractors have ignored the specifications altogether. The road was to have been 20 feet on the Solid, and all stuff taken from the upper side or cutting was to have been thrown over the bank and allowed to find its own angle of repose. Instead of which they have built up the lower Bide with rotten stone and logs, and instead of being 20 feet on the solid, it is not more than 18 and 19 feet wide on the average. And as for the batter, there is none on the cutting at all. If the members of the Board allow such work to be passed, they are not fit to hold the position the ratepayers have placed them in. In fairness to other contractors who tendered for the job, they should be made to adhere to the specifications. The Board, I understand, has set its face against taking work off contractors' hands until completed according to specifications. For instance the Purple Peak road, for which the men have not received a shilling. I don't think that the Board should have any pet contractors, but serve them all alike, and do justice to both contractors and ratepayers by not letting any man off from his job till it is completed according to specifications. If the contractor should lose money on his* work it is no business of the Road Board's; it is his own fault, and he can blame no one but himself for it. Yours, &c, PICK AND SHOVEL.