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Akaroa Mail and Banks Peninsula Advertiser, Volume V, Issue 420, 30 July 1880, Page 2

.The report of the Railway CommisI sion is now before the House and the country. We. do, .not purpose on this 'occasion to comment upon it in detail. With much that it- contains we fully agree, though we cannot help feeling that its recommendations, if valuable, are at any rate somewhat costly. As the Lyitelton Timef.. observes : —''There is not aline in the report of the Commission that could not have been written by a decently competent Minister for Public Works. in his. office, from the materials at his'command, ,, , As we have already stated, we do not on this occasion intend to go through the different portions of this report seriatim. Not unnaturally the recommendations of theXJommissioners regarding the Little River and Akaroa railway possess the greatest interest to us and to our readers. As the question is of the very greatest importance to the district, we make no apology for reproducing these recommendations which appeared in our telegraphic advices last issue ;— " Lincoln to Lake Forsyth—The works upon this section are in progress, and should'be completed to the end of the seventeen miles now. under contract. IA railway to tliat point will bring Akaroa to within an easy* distance of ChriMtchurch, and would probably takethe greater part of the jiassengei traffic which now goea by the V\<"■.' ' . ] ■, . i '' i "Lake Forsyth to Littlo River—This ■section would' be more expensive than that from Lincoln to Lake Foraytb, and would not, we consider, add materially to the traffic. Wβ, therefore, do not think it desirable to continue the line beyond the last-named point, i. •. , '• Little River to Akaroa—The works upon thie line would be generally expensive and would involve the construction of a long tunnel. The population of the district is comparatively . suiall, find we do not see a prospect of sufficient return for the outlay to induce us to recommend that it should be incurred. Now, in any remarks we may make upon this report, we shall of course lie under the disadvantage of being considered in the light of interested parties ; nevertheless, we cannot help expressing our conviction , that, whether the Akaroa railway is a fit one for the colony' to undertake or not, at any rate the Commissioners have utterly failed to grasp what is claimed for it by its advocates.' " A railway to that point (Lake Forsyth) will brjng Akaroa to within an easy distance of Christchurch." If this were all that were aimed at, it would indeed be madness to throw away money on such a line at all. Over and over again has it been ■pointed out that a line which will perlups cause a few additional holiday-makers to visit Akaroa, or enable Peninsula, residents to run? up -to'town' a little oftdier than usual, is not one to be expected to prove remunerative/ ' Wet 'have'an idea here —riglitly or wrongly founded-i-that it is desirable to unite one of t thp 'finesjt harbors ;in the colony with the Plains. The Commissioners should have at least condescended to notice this theory, and, if necessary, refuted it. They do nothing of the kind. They assume that the railway is required solely to convey a few holiday-makers or' health-seekers to and from a quiet retreat, '- arid J then patronisingly tell us that seventeen miles of line is sufficient for this purpose. The assertion of the Commissioners regarding the second section of the line displays, if possible, a greater want of consideration than the first. They are of opinion that the extension of the line to Little River " woiild not add materially to the the special coach and the driving which brought them in such unprec'edcntly quick an expense thrown away, that anyone who a shingle desert Waseoe's. as tlie must bo—well, vre and say—peculiarly matters. lit docs not euity of a Royal that, by going a lew some magnificent limber coul^^^^A

land eminently suited for settlement would be tapped. We feel sure that, if the line be opened at all, it must be continued up one or other of the valleys of Little River. We venture to predict that, when this is done, instead of the extension " not adding materially to the? traffic," the latter will'be increased.fcom five to tenfold. ' '' / - Altogether, this portion, of the report npppars to us eminently unVatisfaptory!; and this not, because its recbrejmendatuW. are atlvefso to, the coristructidn,'bf/tha, "railway, biiibecause jt' betrays J absence of anything like an enquiry into the proposed railway as a whole ; it ignores without attempting to answer ffho argument* that have been adduced ■in -its - favor, 'arid some of"*its recommendations are evidently not only based on insufficient evidence, but are formed directly in the teeth probabilities.