CHEAP RAILWAYS.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume VI, Issue 75, 30 March 1871, Page 3

CHEAP RAILWAYS.

The following paragraph, on cheap railways is from a Victomn paper: — The Corn Law League won ils victory as much by ils tracts and its rhymes as by its orators, auu wo could wish that the friends of cheap railways would establish a literature of their own. The first pamphlet on the subject has not appeared till now, and it has been left to 'a candidate for a seat in the Assembly to issue itMr. 11. Spensley's published lecture is neither the better nor the worse because it is addressed to the electors of Portland. What it deserves consideration for hy every elector in the colony a great deal more than any questioa of faith in this statesman or that, or the- expediency of one Customs duty over another, is the facts it contains of the great/ Railway Revolution of the day. Th^re were committee?, no doubt, who never imagined that the running of S^'phenson's "Little Wonder" in. 1829 affected them, and we here appear to be equ- lly oblivious that the test just made of Fair lie's " Bogie " en^iue can in any way concern us. And yef; our out-lying districts are hungering and thirsting for railway communication, and if we are to export agricultural produce profitably to England — if we are to have this oountry made to blossom wiih homesteads in our day — cheap, easily-constructed linos we must have, becuise rivers and canals are denied us. The pamphlet in question recapitulates the facts that the result of absolute working tests is tho adoption of the "Bogie" principle by the Governments of Russia and Norway, its official recommeudation within the- last three months <o the Indian Government, by one of the most talented and practical commissions ever appointed, and the unhesitating and unreserved declaration by Captain Tyler, the English Government Inspector of Railway, that " the cheapness with which such a line can be constructed, the quantity of work which can be economically performed upon it, and the safety with which trains run over it, render it an example which will undoubtedly be followed sooner or later in Great Britain, acd especially in India and the colonies, when it is desirable to form cheap lines for small traffic, or as a commencement in developing the resources of a new country." Stephensou never had such emphatic and general testimony in his favor. And the success of the "Bogie" principle means that we could eon-truct three miles of railways where even on t!ie cheap NorthEastern lino we are now constructing one. If, instead of spending £9000 per mile on that line, the new system could be adopted and the partially completed fifty miles altered to a 3ff. gauge, sufficient mouey would be saved to btiiid railways from Portland to Coleraine, Gcelung to Oolac, and, with the moneys already in hand, a railway from Ballarat to Hamilton. We would be the last to counsel rash steps, but the new Parliament will surely pause before procee>!iug with railways on the old principle, as if finality had been obtained with Stephenson and Brunei. The reports of the International Commission and the Indian Commission on the "Bogie" principle are available for reference, and an officer might be dispatched to report on the Queensland lines, where the principle is actually adopted, and where assuredly passengers are carried for 50 ppr cent, lower fares than those charged in Victoria, although the wages of laborers and the cost of material are 50 per cent, higher. If that is not sufficient, the interest on a short experimental Hue, f say to Heidelberg, might be guaranteed, and the thing put beyond the possibility of doubt.