The Sun 12 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND SATURDAY. NOVEMBER 16, 1929 THE ROADLESS NORTH

Sun (Auckland), Volume III, Issue 822, 16 November 1929, Page 8

The Sun 12 WYNDHAM STREET, AUCKLAND SATURDAY. NOVEMBER 16, 1929 THE ROADLESS NORTH

THE Auckland Automobile Association ventilated ail important topic during' the week when it discussed the delay in spanning the many gaps of uumetalled main highway in the North Auckland peninsula. Road work has been goiug on in the north on a considerable scale now for two or three years, hut at a critical stage grants have been withheld and, through no apparent fault either of the Main Highways Board or its executive officers, the people of the north may have to endure two more winters of impassable roads. In spite of the present Government’s professions of eagerness to get on with works of this character, which will do so much to ameliorate the disabilities under which settlers in the north have laboured for many years, it cannot escape a share of the blame. The Highways Board’s programme was first of all thrown out of gear by the uncertainty over the £.200,000 statutory grant. It will be remembered that the Government threatened to withhold this money, hitherto considered an inviolable subsidy on the growing contributions of motorists toward road construction and maintenance. In deference to the outcry from taxpayers and the pressure brought to bear by motor-using sections of the community, the Government finally consented to allow the grant to stand on the old terms. Nevertheless, the Highways Board’s formulation of its scheme of expenditure for the coming year was interrupted by the element of uncertainty thus introduced. Apart from this, there seems to have been delay in the allocation of smaller grants. From the trend of discussion of the subject, it seems that this delay is attributed to obscure political motives, and the logical inference will be that throughout the country grants are being held up so that unexpended money may help the Government to show a surplus at the end of its first financial year. The weather has been a third factor in checking progress in North Auckland in recent weeks, but under the financial arrangements now prevailing it would, in any case, wet or fine, have been impossible to undertake metalling on a large scale until January. Efforts are now being made to have authorisations made sooner in order that metalling may be accelerated, and by this means it is hoped that an early start may be made around Wellsford. where conditions are very bad. The whole situation between Auckland and Whangarei is. indeed, as bad just now as If bas ever been so far as arterial connections are concerned. Persistent wet weather has reduced the clay roads sections to a desperate condition, and this has been so aggravated by the inevitable effects of construction works that even men who know every foot of road in the north are, this week-end. sending their cars by rail instead of attempting lo drive them. In the light of the very effective work done by the Highways Board and county councils in widening and improving the alignment of the roads, the position just now is singularly unfortunate, for even though it may represent an inevitable stage through which all primitive road systems have to pass in the course of their improvement, it reflects a certain amount of haphazard planning and lack of co-ordinated effort. When the Highways Board first undertook improvement of North Auckland roads, it decided to concentrate first of all on providing all-weather roads in the territories not served by rail. The first step, therefore, 1 was the provision of a connection between Kaikohe.and the far north by way of the Mangamuka Valley. Next, the board turned to the Waipoua Forest route north of Dargaville, and to the Whangarei-Ivawakawa Road, both of which have been much improved, though at the expense of the logical central route, via Mangakahia Valley, which is still subject to delay. The third stage of operations was the provision of an all-weather arterial connection between Whangarei and Auckland. The Waipu Gorge on the first section of the road south from Whangarei has been improved out of all knowledge, hut elsewhere there appears to have been diffusion of effort, and it is discouraging to learn that delay at this moment may cause [ six months’ delay later, when the winter of 1931 may intervene ! and upset the concluding stages of the metalling scheme. Except in fine weather the motorist who would traverse the i section between Auckland and Whangarei must have the advantage of intimate local knowledge. For instance, at the present time the road traversed by service-cars working from Helensville to Dargaville swings from the western side of Hie peninsula, at Port Albert, to the extreme east at Mangawai. The central route via Topuni and Kaiwaka is left severely alone. North of Waiwera, on what is to be the main Auckland-Whangarei route, the formation work attempted and now almost completed on the PulioiWarkworth and Warkworth-Wellsford sections has aggravated ; the normally difficult condition of the roads until they are now desperately bad. Here, as elsewhere, the alignment and grading have been brought up to a higher standard than North Auckland roads have ever known before, but it is depressing to reflect j that, even in the north of Auckland, a territory synonymous with appalling roads, two years must apparently elapse before the chief centre, Whangarei, is linked with the outside world by a highway over all its length.