RAILWAY REGULATIONS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2362, 19 January 1915, Page 6

RAILWAY REGULATIONS

SEVERELY CRITICISED. At yesterday's meeting of the Council of the Central Chamber of Commerce, the chairman (Mr. C. M. Luke) made reference to improvements . needed in connection with railway matters. One matter he brought up vitally concerns the public. Mr.-Luke related that a lady had come into Wellington, from the Porima line intending to proceed to Auckland by the Main Trunk line. She came 'into town at 11 o'clock to wait for the train, but an hour before the time fixed for its departure she was ordered from the platform. She begged to be allowed to rest iu the ladies' waiting-room, but her request was refused; then she said she could not carry her own luggage, but they took it out for her. One would think that the production of her ticket would have been enough to satisfy the railway .officials. Ho thought that a letter should be sent to the General Manager asking him that under such circumstances leave might be given for people to abide ia the waiting-rooms. Mr. Leigh Hunt said that the Railway Department forgot that the' railways existed primarily for the convenience of the public, and in other countries where there was competition the railway servants were just as civil and obliging as they were in other competitive businesses. Mr. Hunt nlso criticised the loft-parcels system, and stated that the Department recognised that its tariff was obsolete. He also referred to the system of charging double freight when the goods are in excess of the' weight 'given. This_ regulation was persisted in even when it had been proved beyond all doubt that clerical errors had been made.