✨ Road Commission Report
NEW ZEALAND
GOVERNMENT GAZETTE,
PROVINCE OF CANTERBURY.
Published by Authority.
All Public Notifications which appear in this Gazette, with any Official Signature,
are to be considered as Official Communications made to those Persons to whom they may
relate, and are to be obeyed accordingly.
By His Honor’s command,
H. G. GOULAND, Provincial Secretary.
Vol. I.] THURSDAY, MAY 1, 1854. [No. X.
Provincial Secretary’s Office,
Christchurch, April 20, 1854.
HIS HONOR THE SUPERINTENDENT is pleased to direct the publication of the following Report for general information.
By command of His Honor,
H. G. GOULAND,
Provincial Secretary.
REPORT
Of the Lyttelton and Christchurch Road Commission.
Christchurch, April 7, 1854.
SIR,
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We have the honor to inform you that in accordance with your detailed instructions of the 19th ult., accompanying the “Lyttelton and Christchurch Road Commissioners’ Ordinance,” we have carefully examined the country between Port Victoria and the capital, and beg to lay before you the result of our labours.
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Four modes of communication between the Sea Port and the interior have come under our consideration:
1st. The construction of a harbor at the estuary of the Avon and Heathcote Rivers.
2nd. An open road over the hills which surround Port Victoria.
3rd. A road through those hills by means of a tunnel.
4th. A railway through the same hills by the same means. -
The first of these proposals we at once rejected. It would require the expenditure of a very large sum of money for its completion, and on examining the soundings, we found that the shallowness of water in Sumner Bay would preclude the possibility of forming a harbor which, according to the tenor of our instructions, would allow of the largest vessels engaged in the English and Colonial trade, discharging in security. Independently of this objection, the time required in the execution of such works is so great, and at the same time the success of all engineering operations for the improvement of bar harbors is so doubtful, that we could not take upon ourselves the responsibility of recommending so costly an undertaking.
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We cannot therefore recommend any expenditure of public money upon such a harbor; but we may here beg to suggest that it might materially facilitate the transport of heavy goods by water, and encourage the establishment of steam navigation, if the passage of the Sumner bar were improved by filling up the eastern opening in the reef, thereby forcing the whole of the stream to discharge itself through one definite channel.
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With respect to the second proposal, viz., an open road over the hills which surround Port Victoria, four plans presented themselves to our notice:
1st. A line passing from Lyttelton to Cass’s Bay, crossing the main ridge
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Canterbury Provincial Gazette 1854, No 10
✨ LLM interpretation of page content
🏗️ Report of the Lyttelton and Christchurch Road Commission
🏗️ Infrastructure & Public Works7 April 1854
Road Commission, Lyttelton, Christchurch, Transportation, Infrastructure
- H. G. Goulard, Provincial Secretary