MAIN TRUNK LINE.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 39, 11 March 1909, Page 4

MAIN TRUNK LINE.

PROGRESS OF LAND SETTLEMENT. ■' There is a demand for all kinds o{ land along the Maui Trunk line," remarked me Commissioner oi Crown Lands, ilr ,1. Mackenzie, to a Times reporter the other day when questioned regarding his recent visit to thai locality on Land Board matters. "Our business there was the holding of sales ol township lots at Oiiakuno. The applicants for land were a line type of settlers, and (hose who were disappointed looked as good a stamp as thine who were successful. The latter were informed that there would be further opportunities of acquiring land for seltlemcnl in that neighbourhood before very long. Several surveyors are now engaged getting land ready for the market, and it is noped that within four mouths another block will be ready for settlement quite as good as the last lot of laud offered. That class of country is, of course, all forest, with not a great deal of suitable milling timber on it, but it will make good cattle and grazing country. About 40,000 acres will be uuereii, waging in areas Iroin 500 to 1500 acres, and these will be made available in lots as the surveys are completed. The running of the railway through this new territory has changed the aspect of everything, for it brings into the market land which formerly was not dreamt of as likely to be settled. Along the Main Trunk we are opening up village sites as the forerunners of settlements, twenty allotments or so here and there, tims making rooiu first of all for say, accommodation houses, stores, blacksmith shops, etc., the necessities of all new settlements." Air .Mackenzie mentioned that at Bangilawa, about four miles from Ohakune, on the Wellington side, a company had invested some £15,000 in machinery and electrical plant for treating timber that otherwise looked to be useless and making it durable and preserving it from decay. The timber is put through huge vats and boiled with certain ingredients to stop fungoid growths. "If there is anything in the process, I think it will increase our timber output consider ably," addetl the Commissioner, "for it will mean that the better class of timber, such as riinu, tolara and kauri will be kept for furniture making and like industries and the commoner woods for ordinary building purposes."