The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1909. HARBOR MATTERS.

Gisborne Times, Volume XXVII, Issue 2630, 12 October 1909, Page 4

The Gisborne Times. PUBLISHED EVERY MORNING. TUESDAY, OCTOBER 12, 1909. HARBOR MATTERS.

Tlie worst feature of Mr. Merchant's latest report is that it seems to put the Outer Harbor project further off than ever. By the time that another £l3>ooo has been added to expenditure already undertaken, the Board will be saddled with quite as much liability as the ratepayers are likely to sanction in the meantime. Yet the position seems inevitable. While the Board was sitting yesterday the s.s. Squall was stuck in the mud in mid-channel, and had to be lightened before she could be brought to the wharf, an experience that lias, unfortunately, been a common one of late. There is a limit, of course, to the amount of inconvenience which shippers Avill put up with, and we in Gisborne have- approached too near that limit for the good of the port. The trade of the place cannot bo stopped whilst the people are making up their minds whether or not they will stand the expense of a proper harbor, nor even for the period which would necessarily elapse before such a work, if started immediately, could be completed.. Year by year, and even quarter by quarter, the business of the port increases, and it therefore becomes the pressing necessity that the river channel shall be made as efficient as possible. It will never take the place of a deep-water harbor, but it can, and must, serve as a stop-gap for many years to come, and to get the best from it money must apparently be spoilt much more freely than has been the case in the past. No one but Mr. Lysnar believes that the channel can be kept clear without an up-to-date* dredger, and this, with its complement of barges, will cost close to £50,000. Then the entrance to the river is so dangerous for traffic in rough weather that an alteration is urgently necessary, and if we are to accept Mr. Merchant's estimate, the only way to ensure satisfaction and safely iis to extend the breakwater, at a cost of £13,000. It is true that, as an alternative, Mr. Marehant suggests that reducing The groyne might meet the difficulty, but lie evidently has such pronounced misgivings on this proposal that we are forced to look upon it -as a very doubtful experiment. The only consoling reflection about these expensive harbor bills is that the work is of a permanent nature for, no matter when an Outer Harbor is taken in hand, the inner port) will always be largely used, and any expenditure undertaken in the direction of improving the channel, so long as it achieves its purpose, will in the end prove to have been money well spent.