Local and General

Chronicle (Levin), 4 March 1949, Page 4

Local and General

Sunday Trains Opposed The restoration ' of Sunday special trains is' oppose'd by the Auckland branch of the Amalgamated Society of Railway Servants on the ground that it will impose a heavier burden of work on a staff 'already working long hours and j have a detrimental effect on j health. A resolution was carried iat a meeting of the branch proI testing against the running of j"social passenger trains" on Sat- , urdays and Sundays until there was a substantial improvement in ;the staffing position. j Ex-seiwicemen Teachers j Maturity and breadth of experii ence were vital factors which apparently more than balance'd ! lack of educational attainment, said the principal of the Auckland ! Teachers' Training College, Mr. R. A. Dickie, in his report for 1948. ! Two per cent. o-f students admitted 1 to the college last year were exservicemen- who did not hold the minimum educational qualifica- ■ tions, but they had proved to be very good students. Mr. Dickie was confident that the teaching profession would be richer for the service of those men. Ne\Vs From Singapore More opportunities for New Zealand journalists to work abroad have arisen from the association of the New Zealand Press Association, the Australian Associated Press, and Reuter. Applications are being invited for the position of A.A.P.Reuter correspondent in Singapore. The salary is £1000 sterling a year, with an appropriate allowance. The association provides, at a nominal rental, a piodern and well-situate'd furnished residence, suitable for a married man and family. Applications by letter should be made as soon as possible to the secretary, Australian Associated Press, Collins Gate, 377 Little Collins Street, Melbourne. Bulls Bridge Opening ^ , The Minister of Works (Mr. Semple) is expected to open the new highway bridge across the Rangitikei River at Bulls on March 19. Arrangements for this ceremony are now being made jointly by the Wanganui and Manawatu Automobile Associations. The bridge is 1628 feet long and has a roadway of 24 feet. Work on the structure began in 1946, but protracted delays followed because the contr'actors couid not get the necessary reinforcing steel. The old bridge takes only one-way traffic and is regarded as the bottle-neck of the Wanganui-Manawatu-Welling-ton highway. One And. A Half Million Cats "Statisticians sgem to love collecting strange figures. Recently they have collected for town planners (tnough no one quite knows whyl statistics about the number of cats that live in British towns. Apparently the greatest number of cats is found in the older, more crowded towns, where there are roughly three to every 20 humans; in the newer suburban districts there are only about half as many. Altogether the cat population of Britain today is about 13 per cent. of the human one and in London alone they calculate there must be some 1,560,000 cats. Quite a lot, when you think of the noise one cat dan make on your roof, at night."— From a B.B.C. broadcast. Erosion In Manawatu "It is economically impossible to prevent erosion in the Manawatu River," said Mr. J. Chrystall, chairman of the Manawatu-Oroua River Board!. when giving evidence in a case in the Supreme Court, Palmerston North. Mr. Chrystall quoted the flood of May, 1928, to support his contention, stating that on that occasion eight chains of the stop-bank fell ihto the river, due to erosion. The"® river reached a height of 15 ft. 6 in. A new bank was erected and in January, 1949, this bank was also breached due to erosion. The sum of £7000 had been spent on protective work at' this point.