THE Hauraki Plains Gazette. With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto: Public Service. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, & FRIDAY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1922. RIVERS AND FLOODS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXIII, Issue 4374, 6 February 1922, Page 2

THE Hauraki Plains Gazette. With which is incorporated THE OHINEMURI GAZETTE. Motto: Public Service. MONDAY, WEDNESDAY, & FRIDAY. MONDAY, FEBRUARY 6, 1922. RIVERS AND FLOODS.

From the article reprinted, in to-day’s issue of the “Gazette” it will be noted that the Netherton residents are alarmed at the policy being pursued by the Government in respect to the stopbank works intended to train the local rivers and deal with .flood waters. While not wishing to create or foster any alarmist spirit, it does certainly appear that the, Netherton people have solid grounds for apprehension in regard to what may happen in the future. It requires no special engineering knowledge to understand that if a great body of water, such as comes down from the Ohinemuri and Waihou watersheds in times of heavy and continuous rain, is confined to a narrow channel there should bte some compensation given for the loss of the present “ponding” areas. But the scheme as being carried out at present will ultimately deprive the rivers of their natural spreading, overflowing, or “ponding” areas for the surplus water, but it does not provide for any effective increase of volume in the river channels. The Inland Waterways Commission (which, unfortunately, did not visit this district) came to the conclusion that the only way to handle the Waikato River was to erect low training walls along the swamp lands, but that no attempt. should be made to bottle up the highest floods, as this course would have been impracticable. It was also laid down that the river should be snagged and dredged in places, and that some places should be widened and others narrowed. The whole idea was to train or “coax” the river to scour out its own channel, but not to try and do the impossible against the forces of Nature. A similar course would appear to.be the wiser one in respect to the local rivers. It is common knowledge that the original policy locally was that the Ohinemuri should be dredged to clear it of the mining debris, starting at the mouth of the Waihou and working upwards. Such a scheme, if given effect to, would lower the bed and increase the capacity, of the river, whereas the stop-banking without dredging must eventually raise the bed and so nullify the effect of the stop-banks. Lowering the bed would serve the interests of both navigation and drainage, and it is difficult to see how any other policy is going to end in anything but disaster. The history of stop-banking, where it

has been completed throughout and of a height intended to dam back the highest; floods, is that the river eventually breaks through somewhere and inundates country which was fondly thought to have been made secure. It would appear that the opportunity of making secure from floods several thousand acres of Crown lands has caused the Government to adopt a scheme that will some day result in an unprecedented flooding of the lower reaches of. the river and the adjacent riparian lands, including Netherton district, the railway, and the town of Paeroa, and that such a flood, while it will rush through breaks in the stop-banks, will recede very slowly through the same channels. The situation is not one upon which the lay mind can dogmatise, but the general public would undoubtedly welcome an investigation by an impartial body of ■experts in regard to the probable effects of the present scheme of operations.