NEW ZEALAND ROADS.

Hauraki Plains Gazette, Volume XXXVII, Issue 4993, 28 June 1926, Page 2

NEW ZEALAND ROADS.

REFERRED TO IN MELBOURNE.

COSTLY UNDERTAKING.

Interesting facts concerning New Zealand roads- were narrated by Mr L. Ashcroft Edwards at the, Australia® Transport Conference, held in Melbourne°recently.

He pointed out that the total road mileage was 64,625, of which 28,553 miles were metalled roads, 17,224 unmetalled, and the balance largely unformed. New Zealand possessed more metalled roads in proportion to its populatoin than the. United States, but the class of maintenance was considerably below modern standard. It was estimated that to bring all the roads up to a good metal standard the cost would be £50,000,000, which equalled approximately £37 per head of the total population. Taking both classes of motors —cars and trucks — into consideration, the proportion to population was one car to 14 persons. In the United States it was one car to seven persons. New Zealand road construction and maintenance presented many serious engineering difficulties. The gradients were severe and numerous. There was a great number of river-beds, many subject to serious floods, and many miles of sandy a,nd swamp lands. He added that the road problem in New Zealand mainly centred round a satisfactory solution of the question as to how 1,300,000 people could finance the construction and maintenance of 64,625 miles of such toads and .attain a standard required by modern motor transport. The distribution of the farming community, the importance of trade, a,nd the number of road-users till precluded any reduction in the road mileage.