Notes and Events.

Manawatu Herald, 19 October 1895, Page 3

Notes and Events.

The first promise made about the Ship fifonal was to cheapen the cost of carriage by bringing large steamers and other vessels from the sea to Manchester, ■ avoiding the heavy landing an^ carting charges at Liverpool, and reducing by one-half the railway and dock rates. Parliament took care that this promise should be kept by enacting that the dock dues at Manchester and rates on the Ship Canal shall be one-half the rates and dues charged on the various descriptions of traffic using the Liverpool docks and the railways to Manchester. Taking separate towns, the clear Baying over Liverpool per ton, in carriage only, alter allowing the redaction in the railway rates that followed the passage of the Canal Act, is to Manchester 6s Bd, to Ashton 6d id,. Rochdale 7s Bd, Stalybridge 6s, Oldbam 5s lOd, and so on. There is an epuivalent gain upon other goods and provisons. The district the Canal serves, with Manchester as the nearest port, has ' of 7,500,000. The total consumption of food imports in the whole district is about 2,000,000 lons. 'The rate of car-

riage of wheat is reduced from 93 lid per ton to is lUd. The Company's work has not ended with the mere provision of a water-Way, dock 3, and machinery— it has, in fact, begun at this point. ! Without careful and something like continuous attention, the real character and importance of the Canal cannot be known or its ben en* ts ; fully realized. The representatives of the Canal Company know this, and have been forced to initiate business which, once planted, may be expected to take root and expand ol itself. They were aware that the ' cattle trade of North America could not be. secured until abattoirs were ready, and they set themselves about preparing for this traffic, with the result that abattoirs are now being built on the Canal, and will be finished, with a capacity for slaughtering 1,000 head a day, about June Ist. The fruit trade has promptly taken care of itself, A new commercial salesroom was opened on November 8 last by the Right Hon. the Lord Mayor. Ij was built by the Corporation in the form of an amphitheatre, and is splendidly adapted I for the purpose intended, namely, a| mart for the sale of fruit cargoes brought via the Ship Canal. Through this medium the fruit brokers and merchants of Manchester have already accomplished a saving for the people of this vast district of 63 per ton under Liverpool rates. The trade is rapidly growing as more vessels engage in it. The Canal haß already produced a saving of 63 per ton from Liverpool to Manchester on the raw cotton, and 4s per ton on the piece goods, or a total saving of 10s on the homeand outward journey.