The Tramway Elections.

Press, Volume LXVI, Issue 20096, 27 November 1930, Page 10

The Tramway Elections.

"Whatever the result may be of to-day's elections, it is to be hoped that it will be something for which a majority of electors have voted. No one knows how much longer ti'amway systems will survive, or whether their end will be gradual or sudden. We know that they represent enormous sums of ticrtup money, and that if they cannot in the meantime be made to pay the consequences will be very serious for everybody. Further, it is impossible to derive much comfort from the fact that the power expenses of the Christchureh system are lower per car-mile than those of Auckland, Wellington, and Dunedin, and that we spend less on maintenance and management. The important consideration is the relation between revenue and expenditure here in Christchureh, not the relation of expenses here to expenses somewhere else. Within four years debentureholders will be asking for threequarters of a million pounds from a Board that hopes then to have in hand a little over half a million, and it will depend very largely on what is done to-day how those hopes turn out. If the public elect a Board whose policy will widen and not narrow the gap between cash in hand and cash to be found, they will deserve what will happen i-n four years —and again in fourteen years, if the system lasts so long. And they will deserve far more than this if they are not even interested ei.ough to cast a vote for the side on which safety seems to them to lie. Although the Board chosen cannot be better than the material offering, it has never before been so important that what is good in that material should bo selected.