CITY YEAR BOOK

Evening Post, Volume CVIII, Issue 135, 4 December 1929, Page 13

CITY YEAR BOOK

TABLOID INFORMATION

COMPREHENSIVE SURVEY

The official Wellington City Year i Book for 1929-30 has been issued and is in several respects a fuller statement of facts and figures than those of previous years. There are many photographic illustrations and a couple of interesting graphs, a new idea in tho Wellington year book, are included. A list of local authorities and public organisations other than tho City Council is added at tho end, and generally tho responsible officers have managed to pack, without crowding unduly, an immense amount of well-illustrated information. Though it ia not altogether wise to attempt to translate a graph into a written statement—for the graph form is used for the sake of greater clearness—the information given in a graph showing how each £1 received by the corporation is made up and how" each £•1 is spent is of quite considerable, interest. Each £1 received is made up of: 2s . 8.6 din miscellaneous receipts; 2s 2.6 d comes from repayments for services rendered by the corporation; Is' 7d comes from licences, fees and fines; 3s S.2d comes from rents; and the remainder, 9s 9.6 d from rates. It is often argued, that tho Wellington Corporation owns too much property, of which a large part is not used to fullest, advantage, but the graph makes clear tho fact that Wellington ratepayers are eased of a considerable burden by the rentals received, the greater part from the old reclamation areas. On the expenditure side it is shown that 4s S.sd of each £1 goes in miscellaneous and non-recurring expenditure--3.9d for the zoo; 2s 6.6 don reserves baths and beaches; 7.7 d for traffic control and allied work; 9.7 das the corporation's share of Fire Board expenditure; Is 2.1 dto the drainage working account; Is 2.5 d for refuse collection and disposal; 11.4 d for scavenging and street watering; Is 7.1 d for general salaries; and Cs 0.5 don street works, easily tho biggest item and likely to remain so for years to come. It would be interesting were it possible to compare this figure with the similar figure for the pre-motor years. SPECIAL LOAN EXPENDITURE.

The second graph shows the total amounts spent on street widening and on unemployment relief since 1901. Both these totals of "special order" loan expenditure, have soared at an ever-increasing rate in the last few years. In 1901 the expenditure upon street widening had amounted to something under £20,000, in 1004 it had reached about £170,000, and from then onwards to 1927 there was a fairly steady rise to about £320 000 gross, or £220,000 net, after the resale of property not required when the widemngs had been carried out. During the last two years, 1927-29, of the period covered the gross figure jumped to about £525,000, or £425 000 net almost half a million. '

Unemployment relief is shown starting from 1922. Until 1926 the total expenditure had stayed on about the £25,000 level; in 1927 it climbed to something about £40,000, and at 31st March last totalled about £160,000. TWENTY-SEVEN YEARS' PAVING.

The third graph sets out the story of permanent paving in the city, wood blocks, concrete, and bituminous hotmix, starting from 1902. Wood blocks pretty well met the position until the immediate post-war years, when the motor came in earnest. In 1918 the total area of pavement was a little over 100,000 square yards, and there the area stayed until 1921, when bituminous paving was commenced with the Cambridge terrace and other comparatively small jobs in that locality. The first of the big loan schemes carried the total to 180,000 square yards by 1925, and a more rapid increase followed upon further loan expenditure in the next four years, to a total to date of almost 600,000 square yards. Tho graph shows that tho cost per square yard, averaging practically £1 in the wood blocking days, has fallen steadily, and is now about 12s Cd per square yard over the whole programme. This latter figure is not, of course, to bo taken as the cost of paving a square yard of roadway to-day, for it is loaded with some share of tho £1 which woodbloeking used to cost. This graph is a very complete reply to those who maintain that "Wellington in summer time is as dusty as ever, dustier, in. fact, for the sake of greater emphasis, but what "Wellington would have been under modern motor traffic had not these great paving programmes been carried through one cannot visualise. This year's issue of the year book is quite .the most comprehensive guide and reference publication of Wellington facts and activities so far presented. The information is necessarily generally in tabloid form, but the main objective, of getting it all in, has been successfully achieved.