NEWS AND NOTES

Manawatu Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 2671, 13 December 1923, Page 1

NEWS AND NOTES

A large catch of blue metal (co-arse-grained grey waek) lias been located on Rocky Creek, half-a-mile up the old Horokiwi Road, which leaves the TTntt road about lialf-a-mile on the Wellington side of the Knrokovo stream. Messrs. James Martin, of the Hutt, and George ITaigh, of Wellington, who have seemed a block of 25 acres of this land, linve submitted samples to (lie. Min -

is tor for Mines, who a tier having il analysed, has pronounced it to be a good class of metal, exoellenl for road-making. Ore at boulders, some 15 to 20 lons weight, lie about the creek, and there is said to be an extensive face of metal, equal in quality to that submitted to the Department. Though the Horokiwi Road is stiffly graded, the creek lies f)oft. to 1001't. below it at the point where the metal is exposed, and it would not lie difficult to make a tramway from the spot to a position alongside the Hutl road suitable for the establishment of a crushing plant. Interesting light on the Dominion’s housing problem is shed by the annual report of the Statistical Department on housing progress during the year. The increase in population in the areas covered bx the statistics—-cities, boroughs ami town districts —was 15,300. “The average number of persons per inhabited private dwellings in 1031 was 4.27, so on this basis 3584 houses were required to house the. increase of population. Actually the permits issued last year numbered 5035. Making an allowance of one pei' cent, of those not actually built, though permits were obtained, and an allowance of 350 t’oi bouses destroyed by live or demolished, the net surplus of houses towards effecting a reduction in the housing shortage was some 1040. It is a curious commentary on the involved state of the housing question,” added the report, “that by fertile greater building activity took place in the North Island, wheras the greater relative increase of pop illation was in the South.