MAKURI NOTES.

Wairarapa Daily Times, Volume XIII, Issue 4052, 2 March 1892, Page 3

MAKURI NOTES.

(From Our Own Gonttpondtnt.) The roads out here are muoh worse now, owing lo the rain. TheTeAu-. papa may be said to be practically closed lor the winter, as it is already very greasy and getting worse every day. From henceforth, then, traffic (fill go in by the Toretia road, and Makuri Valley. " The stranger, who stub from Pahia • tua, must find the Toretia road aa he best can.' There is no sign post, nor any veryparticularmark todistinguish ltfrom other roadsgoitigeaslward from / the maiu road. When he gets as far as the Manguramarama creek he may enjoy a laugh, The r.oad irced to go over a bridge, hut they have diverted the creek, and filled it in, so the road goes o»eron solid earth, beside .whioh the old bridge stands, Its decking is torn off and turned over with the spikes sticking up. Posted up is a notice that it is unsafe for traffic, signed "Samuel Bolton," Certainly if a man couldn't seb it was unsafe, and tried to get a horse on the spikes, be wouldn't mind the notice. I mention this as rather charac* teristic of the way the Council do their business. It is not long since they passed the famous " short cut" resolution, to the effect that v wbenevor anyone found a short cut he mis to proclaim it, This J?as meant as a sarcasm directed a settlor who said the County ought to make bridle tracks round bud bog boles. But as the general |,nhlio did not understand the official joko the resolution has been published all over the world (I saw it in the Sydney Bulletin of February 20) as nn instance of official incoherence, making the County a laughing stock just as Bomo of the Loudon vestries are. The County Cnunoil is mainly composed of people who have roads to their own.phces and know their own road or roads, They have no sort of feeling either for visitors or outlying Bottlers, If they would rouse themselves, get a decent county map published, and keep existing roads passable, putting up sign posts whero needed, they would deserve our thanks, But they ought to do far more than that, If they would keep public at" tention directed to the vay our roads kg behind settlement, they would soon compel the Government either to mate the roads or pass an Act injAing their borrowing powers' Makuri township is sold, and is a considerable depot. Yet the nearest point a dray can get to is four * miles off. If bush is to bo felled and stock got in without great money loss, the road ought to have been metalled right into Makuri township before now, and beyond the township the three roads to Woodville, Danevirke and Aobariga ought to be under construction, The new block just open for sale in the Makuri Valley is about seven miles beyond Makuri, All the food, tents, wire, etc., required hm to be carted to the Gorge, packed to Makuri, and then again packed to its destination, The delay, loss, and breakage that results can hardly bo believed by anyone who has not tried. It all comes to this, that the work of effecting a settleincntin heavy bush la extremely costly and slow, and the one thiog wanted to mitigate its difficulties is a decent road, If all tho settlers were large ' with say 2000 to 6000 acrSrowh, and able to make contracts for tbe delivery of large quantities ot stores, a road might not be quite so badly needed, But where the majority of settlers are comparatively small people, and want their goods in small quantities and at frequent intervals, the present, syßtem is heart breaking. I sincerely hope that when the r large blocks of forest round Danevirke are thrown open for Bale, tho Government will make metalled roads'through them before selling them, so that no settler may be more than three or four miles from a metalled road, for a formed road (if not metalled) gets so bad after a little traffic thai it is almost worse than a pack track, When yon get along the Toretia Toad as far as theTiraumea river you are sotne seven miles from Pahintoa. You then cross the river and enter on the Makuri Valley road, This is being metalhd. Not much isdoue k yet, but I believe the contractor will now bo ahead until tbe road is metalledjs to the Gorge. The Gforge itself is being formed and metalled by some eight gangs of pemplqysd, It js shopking traveling at as a road under construction mqst be, especially when dope bit by Int. Nofl~ a few months itwjllbeverydifferent.