STRAND EXTENSION

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 8, Issue 63, 10 April 1945, Page 5

STRAND EXTENSION

COURSE OF HIGHWAY

HARBOUR BOARD SEEKS

INFORMATION

"Although we have had the Main Highways Board here, we are still uncertain as to what course the State Highway will taky through to said' Mr W. R. Boon, chairman of the Whakatane Harbour Board at last Friday's meeting when discussing the plan of the Strand Extension Scheme. "Until we have this information we cannot proceed with our propostal."

A letter before the Board from the Chief' Surveyor (Lands and Survey Department) forwarded approved copies of the plan and requested that when all documents had been completed thej' should be forwarded to the District Engineer P.W.D. ' 1 auranga.

Continuing Mr Boon said that if the highway was to come over the Board's mudflat reserves it would be a big thing for the jSoard, as the whole of its future subdivisions would depend upon it. When it was finally decided one way or the other the Board would know what to do and he suggested that when the Hon. R. Semple, Minister of Works visited the town in the near future he. should'ne asked to state definitely the course of the route which would be followed. It would be uneconomic for the board to assume either one thing or the other and to proceed with its plan.

Mr Leather: What do you want across the flats —a State Highway or a Main Highway ?

Mr Boon: It is immaterial to us. It won't make a scrap of difference, but we do want to know if a road is coming that way at all.

The Secretary read a letter from the Wool Pulping and Paper Workers' Union supporting the Borough and the Harbour Board in their efforts to bring the State Highway into the town. Mr Boon pointed out the heavy expense which would devolve upon the ratepayers of the County if ever the State. Highways now running from Tauranga and Rotorua were linked at Edgecumbe. This would mean lie said the cutting off of 30 miles of existing State Highways, the maintenance of which would be thrown back on to the ratepayers. Many residents in the County failed to realise that once a State Highway lapsed into a main highway it became the responsibility of the County with of course the assistance of a subsidy. As a State Highway it cost the ratepayers nothing. It would pay the. ratepayers of the County handsomely to have the existing Tauranga State Highway extended across the mudflats into Whakatane.

The meeting appointed Mr Boon to interview the Minister of Works when he visited Whakatane to go into the question, and to obtain from him if possible some definite ruling as to which coursc the State route was to follow.