NEW RAILWAY BRIDGE.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVI, Issue 4848, 3 July 1925, Page 2

NEW RAILWAY BRIDGE.

—■V ■ • PEDESTRIAN USE FORBIDDEN. DEPARTMENT’S PROPOSITION. At yesterday’s meeting of the Ohinemuri County Council the erection of the new railway bridge over the Ohinemuri River at Paeroa was discussed. The matter was brought up by a letter from the Railway Department in reply to one from the council asking that upon the erection of the new railway bridge residents might not be deprived of the facilities accorded them to cross to and from the town by way of the railway bridge,- the department writing as follows :— "In reply to your letter of March 3 last, with reference, to the use by residents of the footway on the Paeroa railway bridge, I have to inform you that the use of the footway, has never been allowed. Notices are displayed at each end of the bridge warning the public against trespassing. Between 1910 and 1913 several persons were prosecuted for trespassing, and efforts were made to suppress the growing tendency to use the bridge as a means of access to the west side of the river. Apparently of recent years the trespass has been allowed to continue unchecked, but such trespass cannot be allowed to continue. The proper .thing to do is to provide a footway attached to the new structure, and the Railway Board of Management, to whom the - matter was referred, approves of the provision of a footway, provided your council pays the cost of construction, estimated at £260; and agrees .to pay the cost of maintenance.” Or. Corbett, said that he thought the expenditure.,,was not warranted, considering that there were so few ratepayers, but if the privilege was stopped it would cause considerable inconvenience. The riding members should look into the matter. He suggested that a conference might be arranged between the county, the borough council, and the residents concerned. He instanced how the property of Claudelands had nearly trebled in value when the department . had put a footway on the railway bridge over the Waikato River at Hamilton.

The matter was referred to the chairman and engineer, wtih a gestion that it be taken up with the' Paeroa Borough Council and the ratepayers concerned. T'lic chairman thought the isuggestion a good one, and s.aid he agreed with Cr. Corbett that the future should be looked to. There was no reason why the land on the left bank of the Ohinemuri River should not become valuable as residential sites some day. The clerk pointed out that when the present railway bridge was planked over the top of the sleepers the wording on the notices displayed at either end of the bridge was altered from “trespassers will be prosecuted” to “trespassers are liable to prosecution.”