TARANAKI GOVERNMENT GAZETTE.

Extract from Government Gazette, dated 26th June, 1865.

Preliminary Report to His Honor the Superintendent and Provincial Government of Taranaki on the proposed Refuge Harbor at New Plymouth, by Messrs. Balfour and Doyne, Civil Engineers.

Having visited New Plymouth and made a careful examination of the Roadstead, and collected a mass of information from those of the inhabitants who, from their callings and long residence seemed best qualified to form opinions, we are now in a position to make a preliminary report.

On the whole of the West Coast of New Zealand, from Milford Sound to the extreme north of the North Island, being a distance of about seven hundred miles, there is not a single port in which a vessel can with security ride out a westerly gale, with the sole exception of the anchorages in Cook’s Strait. These anchorages are very valuable, doubtless; but they are all to leeward, and a vessel compelled to run for any of them might take days to recover her former position.

These considerations give to the construction of artificial Harbors at any point of the West Coast a very much greater national importance than it would otherwise be entitled to, and will justify, if not necessitate, the interference and support of the General Government in order to ensure that the proposed works shall be adapted for colonial wants.

Even in England, where the rule prevails of leaving all great works to be carried out by private enterprise, lighthouses and harbors of refuge are made exceptions, and in the cause of humanity and the interests of commerce, are constructed at the national cost wherever required.

The Province of Taranaki is naturally entirely destitute of Harbor accommodation, and its progress has certainly been greatly retarded in consequence, as the difficulties of settling a population and of establishing and developing an import and export trade are thus greatly increased. The direct pecuniary loss to the community resulting from the want of a proper Harbor is estimated by Mr. Chilman, the Collector of Customs, to have been upwards of £15,000 during the year 1864, and while the indirect loss arising from retardation of the progress of the Province cannot be estimated, it is certain that the outlay entailed by the Native wars, not on Taranaki alone, but on the Colony, is enormous, and would probably have been saved had the Province been more thickly peopled and had the material prosperity of the natives been enhanced by more extended trade.

The construction of a safe and commodious Harbor in the Roadstead of New Plymouth is therefore not only essential to the prosperity, perhaps even to the continued existence of the Province, but it is also a question of national importance, as tending to protect the shipping and develop the resources of the Colony; and hence it seems reasonable to expect that the General Government should render all the assistance in its power to promote such an undertaking; by, in the first place, defraying the expense of the engineering investigation which we have recommended to be undertaken, and afterwards by aiding the Province in carrying out the works, should the result be as satisfactory as our preliminary examination would lead us to expect.

Our examination of the locality and the evidence we have collected on the spot have satisfied us that there are not only no insurmountable difficulties in the way of constructing a first-class Harbor at New Plymouth, but, on the contrary, remarkable and rare facilities which promise to reduce very considerably the cost of the work and justify the outlay necessary to procure a thorough examination and survey of the Roadstead, upon the completion of which we hope to be able to bring forward a practicable scheme for the construction of the requisite works by a moderate expenditure extending over many years; and until such survey be completed, we consider that it would be imprudent to enter upon any expenditure on works, or to attempt to mature any scheme for the supply of Harbor accommodation for the West Coast of New Zealand.

Dunedin, 17th May, 1865.

(Signed) JAMES M. BALFOUR,
W. J. DOYNE.

Printed under the authority of the Government of the Province of Taranaki, by Charles Brown, of Brougham-street, New Plymouth, Printer to the Provincial Government for the time being.