TRAFFIC CONTROL

Bay of Plenty Beacon, Volume 9, Issue 83, 7 June 1946, Page 5

TRAFFIC CONTROL

PARKING ON STRAND INSPECTOR’S RECOMMENDATIONS Inspector Sharp (recently appointed Traffic Officer) had a few friendly criticisms to offer the Borough Council last Tuesday evening. He pointed out that the existing by-laws with regard to traffic control needed overhauling and revising and added that he had made arrangements for the Chief Traffic Inspector to visit Whakatane and confer with the Council before its next meeting. He mentioned that one of the problems was the number of heavy goods service vehicles which habitually delivered in town and parked behind the smaller vehicles, very often preventing them from pulling out. This practice, he contended, should be stopped. There were many rear entrances to businesses and wherever possible these should be used. He suggested that probably a period for deivery could be fixed between 9 and 10 a.m. and 3 and 4 p.m.

Mentioning pedestrian crossings, he said that these should be marked yith regulation standards. Only when these were erected could successful prosecutions be instigated. With regard to the traffic coming into the Borough, he added that from his own observations many vehicles were seriously overloaded, many had de-. fective headlights and no tail lights. As for bicycles there were, dozens without lights at all. So far he had not prosecuted but had only warned offenders. He would welcome some guide and indication from the ‘ Council in this direction. The Mayor thanked Inspector Sharp for his report, which he said touched on many things which the Council was already conversant with, but which were admittedly problems which had to be overcome. He read a letter from the Road Services Manager stating that if the Council insisted on enforcing the inspector’s recommendation with regard to the delivery of heavy goods, some 37 firms would suffer as they had no rear access. The Council decided to await the Chief Inspector’s visit before going further with the matter.

Discussing the matter of parking later in the meeting Cr Shapley said he did not entirely agree with the suggestion of parallel parking. There was also the question of heavy lorry parking in the main street. It had to be remembered that the two alternative side streets were very limited in their width and if large lorries attempted to use them for delivery at the rear entrances of business premises they were going to block the whole roadway. Cr Warren instanced several premises which had no rear entrances at all. From what he had learnt he understood that a reasonably good compromise had been reached with the Road Services and he thought that there should be no trouble in future.

Cr Creeke suggested a small subcommittee should be set up to go into the matter before the Inspector arrived.