Local & General

Chronicle (Levin), 23 August 1948, Page 4

Local & General

New Railway. Wagons" The importatioh of new wagons' has enabled the Railway Department to alleviate to. some extent the shortage of folling s'tock fbr freight trafiic. Of 3000 wagons ordered from Gredt Britriin, 2976 have b66n' serit'.tb the "Doffiimbn, and of these mor.e? than 2280 have been assembled ' arid' pl'aced in trafiic. The railway workshops have assembled the wagons at an average rate of 50 a week. Shock For Australiaris Twenty Australialis who arrived in Auckland bn "'Ffiday by air' became the first Australian visitors to the pominidii, for about1 15 years who recbived lebs than f ace value for . tlieif ' mbney.,, . They received only ,15s ,9d for eacli Ausr tralian pound, The. first one,,passeng'er knew. apout the changed rate was when he read it in a Sydney morning papfeib.on .the.plane. Big Air-freight t^arjgb One of the bigge'st single consignments carried b'y kit freight i Dakotas across Cook Strait sinqe |the service began is being trarisjported between Woodbourne and | Paraparaumu. It ..comprises _ 23 I tons of earthenWa?:e . drajn pipes, iwhich are being delivered from a t Christchurch firm ' to the GreyI town Dairy Compdriy. About seven j trips will be required. to lif t the load. I ! , Scoflt Reunion Scouts from Wellington, Palj merston North, . Levin, Rotorua, ! Matamata and .Thames gathered 1 in ftotorua over the weekend to | celebrate their first, reunion of the j Titoki troop which; ,was part of i the New Zealand cpntingent to the ijamboree in ^Franbe last year. A ire-union dinner was held in the 'Rotorua Scout Hall where- 'the boys are staying.',- The weekend was spent in seeing~~the.. sights. Cheapei- Petrpl . ' • ; . Petrol • may cost twppence. . a. galion 'less as a -rqsidfc' pL the? ;new? exchange iaXea the cost will he . ..rpdtibed . ,tp ' the same extent as Other inipOrts, but ! as the original cost of • petrol, after deductiOn of fax, retaiier's allowance, freight and other charges, is only about lOd a galion, motorists can expect the price to be reduced only about a fifth of that amount. Chateau Tongariro Fully Booked The long-anticipated openifig Oi the Chateau Tongariro, which had been closed since W&r was declared in 1939, took plaiqb ' On Saturday. The Chateau was taken oyer by' the Health Departpieht in' 1940 to house the patieiits pf.^thb Porirua Mental Hospital'. ' Ihe openihg will prove a great boOn to tramping and ski7ihg parties. There are already ^50 people bdpked .in, the maxifhum nuniber avaiiabie at the moment, but there Will be1 accommodationr for "452 when the building is full/ bobimiSsiOried. Mr. L. J. Bayfield.-i.s manager of the Chateau, .. Hoardings on Rqa$slde ' , . ' , Disappointment "that the private member's Bill in Parliament . providing for the abblition of roadside hoardings had not been passed by Parliament was expressed by Mr. W. A. Sutherland (Wellington) at the North; is'lan'd MotOr Union confererice ih. Wanga'ui. He classed as entirely ,false the statement that had beeri; made that . artistic hoardings ■ improved the beauty of the countryside, stating that the artist' brush could not improve the handiwprk of Nature. He considered that the conference should in na t uncertain wa f express its apprdval of the abolition of hoardings in couhtry areas. He added that- the. loss of reveniie to the Railways_ Department would be smali in . bomparisbn with the working loss of the department.