OUR RAILWAY.

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume XV, Issue 120, 20 May 1880, Page 2

OUR RAILWAY.

To the Editor ov the "Evening Mail.*' Sir — In answer to your correspondent "Progress" in your yesterday's issue, he asks, "then why urge the extension of the present line for a few miles to nowhere?" lie is right in that the whole line from Bell Grove to the Owen on the Buller, a distance of about 65 miles, "is nowhere." I mean there is nothing to come from those barren hilla. Now I ask, whose fault is it? In the session of 1878 our members agreed with the late Government that the railway should be made from Amberley to Cook Straits, that is through Waiau, Auiuri, Haumer Plains, Tarndale, and Tophouse to Foxtaill, and that

was carried out by the late Government ana unanimously agreed to by the Inland Communication Committee, and also by the ioi disqnt Railway Committee. But all the time the survey of that line was going on, ttiose gentlemen promised and told the people that the railway was goiug to the West Coast. Yet they knew perfectly well that the late Government;, as well aa themselves, never intended to go anywhere else but to Canterbury. The present Government intended to carry out their predecessors plan, but now they know that line is very costly as well as barren of any return for the outlay for many years to come. Therefore they are too honest to spend any public money for so unprofitable a line, but the next thing we will hear is that the Government will order a thorough survey of the Motupiko route, which your correspondent has totally ignored. He says, " The nearest point of any value is the Matakitaki." He must be totally ignorant of tfie country, as the first nine miles would bring the line to the fertile valley of Motueka, with over 1000 inhabitants, and every pros pect of its increasing, and with plenty of timber and minerals of all kinds. Therefore lam sure if our members and the abovenamed Committees had insisted upon the Government making the railway to Motueka Valley, and from thence to the Buller, Reefton, and Greymouth, the line would have been made long ago, as all the working plans were ready, but instead of doing that they agreed with the late Government to make a new survey over the most barren and difficult country in the Middle Island. Let theu now set to work earnestly, and get the line to Motueka Valley, which would then be Real Progress, j Nelson, May 18, 1880.