STREET-WIDENING- IN THE BOROUGH.

Wairarapa Age, Volume XXXI, Issue 9176, 27 August 1908, Page 4

STREET-WIDENING- IN THE BOROUGH.

The Borough Council is reported to have the substantial amount, of £6OO left over on account of the street improvement loan as a result of a ' lesser amount being required for | Park Street than was set down on the schedule. Before the Mayor decides on allocating this amount (with the consent of the Council) to completing the work of tar-macadamising Queen Street, it would be advisable to go into the question of whether tne money could not be better expended I in the manner for which it was i originally intended—street-widening, i There is Dixon Street, for example, i one of the most important thoroughfares in the whole borough, with its , most valuable length—that nearest the heart of the town —over twenty feet less.than a chain in width. Just now property values are undeniably stationary, but the tendency for business sites, like those in the narrow end of Dixon Street will be to increase in value, and that rather rapidly if Masterton rises to be the large provincial centre it gives promise of becoming. The Council will sooner or later have to face the question of making Dixon Street a uniform width, and while there is j such a large sum of money to do at ! least a part of such a desirable J work it would be indeed a pity to allow the money to be diverted to work which can and should be done out of maintenance when the loan money set down for improving Queen Street is expended. The point of the whole matter is this —that the further tar-macdamising of Queen Street will not be increased in costliness merely bscause it may be delayed a year or two, while delays in street widening are very costly matters, especially in business thoroughfares. i There is only Trust Lands Trust proI perty and Council land to deal with ' in the remaining unwidened section of Dixon Street, and the Trustees are likely to facilitate rather than ; check the setting-back of the street boundary, as such would materially enhance the value of their property. [ Seeing that such is the case, it would . resolve itself into a question of compensating Trust tenants —less than half-a-dozen—for the Council to accomplish a work of the nature for which the £6OO balance from Park > Street was intended. It may be a long time before the Council again - holds such a large sum of special loan money, and the opportunity now pre senting itself to relieve a very con- " gested and unsafe thoroughfare is a golden one. Moreover, Queen Street will have a very ample length of tarmacadamised surface when the money yet to be expended on it has been exhausted, as there is little foot : traffic outside the limits of Renall Street at the south end and Bruce Street on the north end. With the , completion of the handsome Technical School, the prospects of Supreme Court buildings being erected in Dixon Street, arid the increasing importance of the Park', the widening of Dixon Street is becoming a matter of growing urgency.