Regarding car-worthy roads [letters page, April 23], I agree with Lee Ford.

I fail to understand why TCC engineers sign-off on such poorly constructed roads. The recently revamped 15^th Ave is a perfect example of a third-rate road if not Third World standard of surfacing. Another is 29A running north from Maungatapu Bridge to Bay Park, then the Hewletts Rd/Maunganui Rd roundabout.

Whether the construction is commissioned by NZTA, BOPRC or TCC it's our hard-earned money being spent and wasted on roads poorly built by construction companies that monopolise the civil construction industry and signed off on our behalf by highly paid council staff regardless of the quality.

End result, your tax dollars wasted, your rates dollars wasted, then you waste more dollars paying for repairs to your car suspension and your tyres prematurely worn out.

But our poor quality roads are just a small part of a much larger problem, Tauranga has too long a history of neglect and poor management by elected councillors who seem capable of only really bad expensive decisions.

It's too bad we don't have a system of recycling wasted opportunities to reduce the garbage we endure.

Shaun McLean, Tauranga