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Saturday, June 28, 2008

Awaiting funding from Cunliffe

Not content with waiting for half-decent broadband services to come to the district so local farmers can continue producing raw material for your expensive blocks of cheese, the Tararua District Council has literally grabbed the bull by the horns and is ploughing 140Km of fibre optic cabling into the ground. First decent thing the council has ever spent money on.

From South to North in Tararua District, all the way from Eketahuna to Norsewood via Pahiatua and Woodville. Places most havve never heard of.

Yes, there is a whole district that is NOT Hawke's Bay, the Wairarapa or Manawatu.

Although it does have the the headwaters of the Manawatu and the gorge where cow 569 did it's bit in the 2004 floods. An aside, the Manawatu is the only river in the world to rise on side of a set of hills (Ruahines, eastern side) and discharge to sea (western side) on the other.

I diverge.

Council even voted (only one dissenting Luddite) to extend fibre another 25 Km. Great stuff, soon will be able to get onto the information superhighway.

Well maybe. It all depends on the election outcome and whether this project can jump the queue for gummint funding. Council talks at Cunners apparently, but since he soon will be out of a job and possibly locked up, the extension probably will not fly.

Oh well, I will just have to put up with slooooow dialup via ISlug. Am lucky that I do know some peple in town that I can use some of their broadband bandwidth occasionally to do updates and the like.

4 comments:

KG said...

"..the Manawatu is the only river in the world to rise on side of a set of hills (Ruahines, eastern side) and discharge to sea (western side) on the other."
How the hell does it do that?

PM of NZ said...

It rises on the eastern side of the Ruahines, flows east past Norsewood, then south past Dannevirke and Woodville, is joined by the Tiraumea / Mangatainoka Rivers coming north from Eketahuna / Pahiatua (past the Tui Brewery with all those 'gorgeous' workers).

From Woodville it goes west through the Manawatu Gorge (between the Ruahines and the Tararuas, windfarm country, another Cook Strait in the making) to Ashhurst. Joined by Pohangina River from north, then flows southward to the sea at Foxton Beach, past Palmerston North and Massey Uni, along the western side of the Tararuas.

Maps on Google/ Manawatu River / Wiki, here endeth the geography lesson.

KG said...

I checked the maps--thanks PM.I'm not really up to speed on the local geography yet.

KG said...

(my other half has rellies who farm in Waipukerau, so we know the highway between Masterton and there fairly well.)