OLD-FASHIONED WAYS.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1559, 1 October 1912, Page 4

OLD-FASHIONED WAYS.

CARTAGE OF TRANSHIPMENTS. In connection with Mr. R. Fletchers proposal that the city tramway servico should be.linked up with tho wharves, and a freight-carrying system between wharf and wharf,'and between tho wharves and tho city suburbs, the propounder informed a reporter that some more expeditious method of handling transhipments would have to be resorted to ere long in tho interests, 01 economy as well fls dispatch. _ Tho board, oontinued Mr. Flctchcr, was now paving as much as <£3000 a year for tho cartago of cargo from 0110 wharf to another, and as th© transhipping of tho port of Wellington was increasing concurrent with tho expansion of the wharves, that amount would grow "pidl.v in tho future. Mr. Fletcher s idea is that, freight electric cars should run down tho main trunk of oach wharf, and that goods should bo transferred to them from the sheds bv the presont hand-trucks, and on filling up with transhipments—say, for Auckland .or Oliristchurch-they would travel round to tho wharf where tho steamer was berthed, and the cargo could bo slung from (he cars into tho we! s hold. Freight cars could be commissioned to take a loud of flour, oats—or any kind ol' freight for that mailer—from tho wharf, and convey it to a depul in the suburb or quarter of ike city to which it was consigned. The same system of freight c.:ir» could also be adopted for the conveyance of fruit and produce from tho wharves ami railway stations right up to the doors of (he Allen Street market?. "It sounds a big thing, but everyone I have spoken to agrees with the idea," said Mr. Flelclier, "and really .something of tho kind will have to be done in tho interests of the public, as at present: a steamer often leaves with only a portion of the transhipments which she should hnvo (and could linvoj secured had we uot to depend on carts for conveying them from wharf to wharf."