Untitled

Hokitika Guardian, 10 June 1929, Page 4

A good deal is being heard on the action of the Ward Government in deciding to complete the South Island Main trunk Railway. Sir Joseph Ward has made it plain that the decision was reached by the Cabinet after a close investigation of the position, and a closer study of the reports by the experts on the matter, and that the Fay-Ilaven report was largely the deciding factor in the matter. The Fay-Raven Commission which reported on the mutter in 1925 stated that it was not so .much nr the local advantage of such a line that between Ward and Parnassus that 4 viewed its completion as of .greater

importance that some other railways upon which considerable sums had Icen . j spent: it was because of the possi nifties offered by its construction of nak.iig a complete railway transport system between all parts of the North and South Islands without change of carriage in the case in the incidence of its goods traffic that they advocived its construction. The commission said that with the line in being a train ferry between Pic-ton and Wellington (or, if possible a bay with sheltered water and easily available by a short railway nearer the South Island) would give all the advantages of i iroughout rail transit between the two islands. “Some day” said the ieport, “ no doubt this form of communication will be established. The sooner it is done, looked at from a railway ad ! ministration opint of view only the ear- ' lier will he the time when it will •>« possible to operate the system as a whole as economically and efficiently as in countries where line arc not ai.‘jointecl. The public aspect needs nit little demonstration. Throughout communication would make the two islands one insofar as transport is concerned. Internal trade would benefit by through rates and fares and avoidance, of break or hulk. The cost of landstations and ferry boats capable of conveying upwards of 50 ordinary good vehicles need not entail very great -fX- j penditure in proportion to the advnn- - tage.s foreshadowed and the prospects of revenue to bo obtained. Probably €500,000 will be found sufficient. The report added that wherever train terries had been provided they had developed travel and traffic to a very much greater extent than obtained und-ir j former fillipping conditions. Between Denmark and Sweden, Germany and .and in North and South A me- j rica this form of bridging the seas has been adopted with success, and just before the time the Commission reported a train ferry service had commenced to run across the ’North Sea between Harwich and Zeebrugge.