IT’S NOT YOUR SUSPENSION, IT’S OUR BLOODY ROADS

It’s easy to think that all roads in NZ are like the bumpy shockers that we endure, but they are not and there are some obvious reasons why not, yet nothing is being done about them.

I recently drove from Wellington up through the Wairarapa, on through the Desert Road and up into Auckland and then up home. It was a lovely cloudless day and the dry brown countryside gave the land and sky a wonderful look like that of a fine landscape painting. Cafes have sprung up and rejuvenated what were once tired country towns making for great touring.

Motoring in such countryside on such a day is a great pleasure added to by the seemingly endless empty ribbons of smooth pothole free highway.

After a night in Auckland the journey continues past roadworks, dodging trucks, avoiding queues where possible and finally getting north of Whangarei where the vehicle starts bouncing and swerving as if something is slightly wrong with it. A quick check and no, it’s not the suspension, it’s our bloody roads.

Every straight, once laid flat is now a series of bumps and hollows, the repaired sections seem to be chosen randomly and don’t mesh with the existing, the traffic is intense and heavy trucks dominate. Why is this?

Well, roading funding is dished out according to population, so all Kiwis get equal access to roading funds. This is not equal access to good roads. Down south, rock is everywhere, roads are cheaper to build and do not settle simply because their geology suits roading better than our soft soils and expensive soft rock.

Also the population that get funded is the same population that use the roads. They don’t have a million Jafas using their roads free like we do.

It’s not as if we don’t have enough MPs up here to argue the case for equal access to good roads, but they’re too busy worrying over parents smacking the kids to bother. They should all be made to get together and fight for equal access to good roads for all Kiwis including those of us who live up here!

That would help