HASTINGS RAILWAY STATION.

Hawke's Bay Herald-Tribune, Issue 80, 21 April 1937, Page 4

HASTINGS RAILWAY STATION.

The chairman of the Hastings Chamber of Commerce did well, as reported yesterday, in raising the question of a new railway station for the town. For a good few years now, for one reaSOn or another, the question has been left in- abeyance. The pfesent seeins to be a time singtilarly favourable to its revival. Our new Government has set itself to carry but a wide scheme of pu'blic works, with a special eye on incraasing and improving facilities for transport hy rail. It has invited local bodies and organisations to subniit to it any objects that might be brought within the scope of the scheme and to few could attention be more appropriately drawn than to the Hastings railway station which has long been very rnuch out of date. Many years bave passed since this was adroitted by the railway authorities themselves. How many it is sin?e matters were brought to the point of securing a new and more spacious site cannot at the moment be precisely Said, btit it must be abdUt a score or more. In the interval the traffic, loth freight and passenger, that has to be served at this station has grown immensely and is still growing, with mt any really substantial improvements for handling it being provided. At variotis times we seemed to be Oii the verge of having these urgently needed requirements satisfied, but so far the expectations thus raised have been disappointed. The opporttinity now offers of pressing the well-founded claims of the town and of the highly productive distri'cts around it upon a Governmeitt whose declared policy should make it specially reeeptive of finy such proposals submitted to it. As has been hinted, it is not only the townsfolk who are specially concerned to see these long delayed facilities provided. It iS ecjually, even if not more, in the interests of the primary producers, for whoSn a vast amount of freight is handled at the Station, that they should' be institllted. It may therefqre be said to be the obvidus dnty of fdrmers' local organisations to back up any efforts that may now be made for securing practical recognition from the Government while indicationgj aVe propitious. In suppOrt of the claim to special consideration for this pfdject it may be recalled that Hastings is peculiarly, perhaps nniquely, placed in having what may reasonahly be termed a railway endowment of v.ery great value. When this part of the town was originally laid out by the private owner who slibdivided it, a very niueh larger area than that now occupied for the purpose was virtually given. by bim to the Government of the day as a site for A railway station. This embraced the whole sweep o£ now valuable business sites reaching from (and includiiig) the Fost Offfce along Russell Street to the Grand Hotel in the main street, FrOm that endowment the Railway Department derives ground fents which would probably much more than " pay interest and sinking fund on the amount required for establishing a new atld modernly equipped Station. Most certainly a realisation of the freehold of this endowment, even leaving the Post Offiee out of the count, would much more than meet the necessary capital expenditure. Beyond this, of course, such a Station might confideUtly be expedted to materially reduce working expenses. On all hands, therefore, Hastings and the surrounding district can make out a really unanswerable* case for special and early .attention being paid to their unquestionable needs. It should remain only for them to be laid impressiyely before the Minister of Public Works and of Railways, and in doing that all concerned should cordially Unite.