River Control In Lower Manawatu

Chronicle (Levin), 21 April 1948, Page 3

River Control In Lower Manawatu

-The Manawatu-Oroua River Board considers tliat the Manawatu Catchment Board's advocacy of a re'duction in the allowance for the settlement of stopbanks from two inches to one inch per foot of height of the constructed stopbank is a retrograde step, and under the present conditions a gift to the contractors. A letter has been sent to the chief engineer of the catchment board setting forth this objection. It stated that two inches per foot has been the recognised standard in the Manawatu district for many years, and it has been justifled for the following reasons: — Firstly, because of the consolidation and irregular settlement that results in the Manawatu district owing to the varying soils and degrees of consolidation in the country over which the stopbanks have to be constructed, and secondly, because of the method of construction by bulldozer in layers, but without detached supervision. The letter went on to state that if the allowance is reduced to one inch per foot, the work should be continuously inspected by a clerk of works who will see that the spoil is placed in layers not exceeding twelve inches in thickness and that each layer Is consolidated before the next layer above it is placed. A sub-committee comprising Mr. R. J. Law and the engineer was appointed to go into a complaint' made by Messfs. K. O. Olsen and A. E. Burling about the outlet of drainage water that used to flow through the discarded Te Maire floodgate. The committee was given power to act on the condition that maintenance of the drain is provided for and none of the responsibility for maintenance is placed upon the board. The engineer reported that to obtain spoil to close this breach it was necessary to take half an acre of grass land' setting back the stopban'k. It was decided to increase the thickness of the weakened length of Burling's Old ' 'Shannon -Road stopbank by taking spoil from the grass land to the scutlr of the bank, to set back two and a-half chains of stopbank one • chain southward and parallel with "Sts present position, and to take spoil out of the drain with a dragline and increase the cross-section of the existing bank. , The engineer ^r eported that the deflecting groyne at the Taupunga Cut at Moutoa is now'completed.