CORRESPONDENCE.

Poverty Bay Standard, Volume III, Issue 233, 23 December 1874, Page 2

CORRESPONDENCE.

(Our columns are open for free discussion ; but we do not hold ourselves responsible for the opinions of our Correspondents.]

TO THE EDITOR. Sir, —“ There are no two ways about it,” if we are to have the possibility of travelling between the port and and the inland settlements during the coming Winter, work in some measure fitted for the existing need must be. undertaken forthwith in a vigorous and systematic manner. What has been done by the present Board, is of more than questionable utility. It is ludicrous, if wo only could afford to laugh at it, to see a heaped up, apparently newly-ploughed fallow, presented for miles and miles as beneficial road-making. Why, even after the few days rain we have had, no dray-man in sobriety would drive hie team on the top of the soft ridge whilst he had the harder furrow, called the water table, to draw on. I could undersland the thing if it were accompanied as made by a layer of coarse stones on the centre, and that covered again by broken metal in the manner of the outer barbarians ; but as it is done, it is time and money injuriously expended ; in fact, we who will be obliged to go to Gisborne occasionally, had better exchange our carts for flat-bottomed boats at once. A further specimen, almost more prominently absurd, is the pancake street now being covered all over at heavy expense with a deep coat of metal. Is that a piece of sober engineering ? And is it fair to out districts that expenditure should be thrown away on a work, which would disgrace Timbuctoo ? I can see but one way out of the difficulty, anil that is that under clauses 75-6-7-8 and 9 of Highways Act 1874, the Road Board should apply to the Superintendent for the appointment of a competent person, who may prevent by his advice and direction, the waste of public money which is so evident. It is nothing derogatory to them as citizens to confess their inexperience as road-makers, and it would save them the weight of accumulated ire gathering in the minds of the ratepayers these two years. If some such action as I suggest be not adopted, the ratepayers may find it their business to ascertain if the statement of the late Board is relied on by the presentone, “ that they are absolutely irresponsible to, and careless of, the opinions of the ratepayers.” What is amiss with the mountain of road-metal ? Is Mr. Skeet in attendance on it for the production of a ridieulus mus, and are we only to expect from it a “ little mischief,” like that which only as yet has come from our grand expectations of the present year ? The payment of an Engineer for district superintendence comes from monies appropriated by the Provincial Government for the purpose, the district paying a small per centage on the work done ; so there need be no equeamishness on that head.—-Yours, &c., Ratepayer.