FUNDS FOR ROAD CONSTRUCTION

Press, Volume XCV, Issue 28259, 23 April 1957, Page 19

FUNDS FOR ROAD CONSTRUCTION

Allocation System Change Suggested (From Our Own Reporter) WAIMATE, April 22. A proposal that the amount available for construction purposes be apportioned on the length of bridges and highways in each county, placed before a meeting at Waimate of thn No. 15 District Roads Council, could quite well become the basis, though not in its entirety, of a pattern for the rest of New Zealand, in the opinion of Major N. A. Rattray, a memroer of the National Roads Board, who reviewed some of the problems with which the board was faced. A statement presented by Mr E. T. Grigg (Ashburton county) said that no consideration had previously been given to correlating the allocation of construction funds to each county with the respective lengths of main highways and lengths of bridges. So far as the No. 15 District was concerned, the method of allocation only followed the arbitrary system used by the defunct District Highways Council. Using the mileage of roads as a basis, the statement said, the apportionment of the 1957-58 allocation to counties of £ 133,700 would be as follows, the figure actually approved in the estimates being shown in parenthesis: Ashburton, £60,859 (£39.200); Geraldine, £21,064 (£30,300); Levels, £12,160 (£15,500); Mackenzie, £12.174 (£14,700); Waimate, £27,443 (£34,000).

On the question of bridges, it could possibly be argued that money required for bridge renewals on main highways should have a bearing on the allocation. Accordingly, the allocation of this year’s available sum would be: Ashburton, £46,527; Geraldine. £28,611; Levels, £15,244; Mackenzie, £7888; Waiinate, £35,430

“As the length of main highways and the- total length of bridges on them would have a definite bearing on the amount of money required for construction work, a mean between the two sets of figures would be a sound basis for apportionment of funds as between the counties,’’ the statement said. The roads council decided to defer consideration of the proposal until its next meeting, as this year’s allocation would be made on the old basis.