THE WEST COAST RAILWAY.

Manawatu Herald, Volume III, Issue 66, 19 April 1881, Page 2

THE WEST COAST RAILWAY.

.» • The Manawatu Times of Wednesday makes a very practical suggestion, to the effect that the settlers of Mauiwatn should insist, before taking us any more shares in the railway company, that no money should hiexpended on the West Coast railway " until the directors are in a position to make the line to its definite terminus in Manawatu." Our contemporary points out that the chiei' anxiety of some of the gentlemen win are on the Wellington directory is to get the line to Porirna. He says:—•• If the people of Manawatu aie~'to acpbrd a liberal support, they should have a distinct guarantee from the directors before another penny is subscribed, that not a sod shall be turned until sufficient capital is at command to poinplete the line to the point of junction in Manawafcn,whereever <i;ay be decided on. The-e are several gentlemen ou the provisional directory who would be quite satisfied if the lino were to be brought to Porirua, and no furth r, and it is just wiclnu the range of possibility that if the work be commenced before the who!e of the shares are taken up, that the "money of the people of Manawiitri might assist the Wellington peop-e in making a railway to a point which would cut our the nasty sea at Terawhifci, but leave thorn isolated iv the interior as before." We ueed hardly say we fully endorse the remarks of our contemporary, as quoted. There is another matter that the Manawatu people should insist upon, viz., that when the work of construction is begun it should go on simultaneously at both ends. Wa have before now commented upon the avarice of the Wellington people iv tryiu i to secur the whole expenditure on the construction of the railway for their end. They would doubtless cany out the same plan of operations under the company as they wished to do under the Gonernineut- proposals. If th> line were begun at Manawatu it would at once tap good country, and yield immediate returns, besides which is the fact that the people of Manawatu are entitled to .it least a share of the benefits to be derived from the expenditure of the money in construction.