RACE TRAINS

Dominion, Volume 8, Issue 2365, 22 January 1915, Page 6

RACE TRAINS

, COPING WITH THE TRAFFIC. The perennial complaint i about the race train traffic has heen raised again. It has even been alleged that the Railway Department did not " realise that the parade of soldiers, would attract a bigger crowd to the races than could ! otherwise have been counted upon. The' answer of the Department to the charge is that they, brought down from the Auckland section 28 extra'coaches to cope with the race traffic'. These, cars will have to be hauled back empty, and the Railway Department do' pot as a rule; undertake such' extra' haulage for nothing'. . : ' "It is idle to expect that on a line built to accommodate suburban traffic thousands of peoole can be carried without some discomfort to somebody," said a railway officer to a Doi.tnion reporter yesterday. "The rule of the station staff is that people shall be admitted to the platform only siter the train has been backed in, ami only in such numbers 'as the train can accommodate. The admission is by several entrances, and the trains are always'flllediiii' li'vety ftw ; minutes, after th'e'giftSS'afe/tipen. When the right number of people are admitted to the platform _the' : gates are closed, and -the ■ crowd waits outside until the next, train is-r&idy. ■ The, objection to allowing the neople. free aoceßs to theplatform is thfit if such were granted crowds would_ rush-trains as they were being drawn in, and .there would he at least a possibility of fatal accident. The Teal trouble is that with one platform the railway, authorities cannot handle crowds as'exneditiou'ly as they are .handled at . other up-to-date stations where there ,:is. a series of passenger docks.; To■ show that no time is lost, it may -be said that on ■_ Wednesday trains'were filled , with their full complement of 450; passengers in two minutes, and that between. 10.10 and 13.4 a.m. iseven trains were disnatched. In +liat time 4000 . people were,. sent to Trent-ham." .