NORMANBY RAILWAY AND TELEGRAPH OFFICE.

Patea Mail, Volume IV, Issue 368, 26 October 1878, Page 2

NORMANBY RAILWAY AND TELEGRAPH OFFICE.

(To the Editor of the Patea Mail.) Sin, —In reading Mr llnrstlionse’s very temperate letter in yonr issue of the 23rd instant, there are some points on which I shall make a very few remarks. The first I shall touch upon is the one concerning the roads which are stated to give far greater advantages to the new site proposed than to the one advocated by myself and the other residents of Normality. It is stated that at the spot laid off for the railway station no less than five roads form a junction, but of these, two are, hardly, 1 think, to be considered. One of them is a road very rarely used leading to the native settlement of Taiporohenui, and the other described as loading to the Waimate Plains-only exists on the map. It is laid oil' ns leading from the Ketemarae road, below Normnnby, towards the Waingongoro river, but not reaching it except by a very circuitous route. This road is not even opened, it being fenced across from the Kefamarae road, and I believe that it is hardly known to exist on the map to the greater number of people. No particular advantage then can be gained by such modes of communication.

The writer seems to lay very great stress on the fact of the proposed station being nearer the centre oE the Town than the site on Mr Brett’s laud, but I think, though in some cases it is decidedly a benefit, it does not hold good in this instance. As I shewed in my last letter, all the population of the Township gather towards that part nearest to where Mr Brett has offered his land, and numerous cases can bo shown where the Government have erected buildings of the nature now required, not according to the distance to or from a centre on the map, but where the largest number of inhabitants have collected. As an example of this we need go no further than Carlyle, and there wc find Court House, Telegraph and Post Offices have been placed in a position far from the centre of the Town as laid off, it is true, but in that locality where the- largest population exists, and where it is, therefore, found most convenient those offices should be built.

Mr Hmsthouse goes on to compare the difference between the manner in which Mr Brett and Messrs Thomson & McGuire gave their land to the Government. The for ner, it is said, offered an undefined piece of land without shewing that he would cut it up into sections, while the latter furnished a complete plan with station and sections marked out ; but there is a very considerable difference in the two cases, and for this reason—the line rims diagonally for a distance of three-quarters of a mile through Mr Brett’s land, which is nearly all clear and laid down for grazing purposes, and in making his proposal he could do no more at the time than he did, that is, to offer the three acres on any portion of the line the authorities thought fit to select. The land is most excellent, and it would have been folly for him to have cut up a number of sections in such an extended space as I mentioned. But it is thoroughly well known by the Government officials and others, that a quantity of the land will be so dealt with should the site be fixed there. Oh the other hand the extension is little better than a swamp in the winter season, and together with its distance from the Township, rendered some strong inducement necessary to insure the sale, and for that reason it was good policy to lay off the proposed sites for the railway station as a means of recommending the property to the public. Mr Hursthouse concludes with a reference to our despondent state, and no doubt some tears will in due time be shed, and as his nature seems to be so sympathetic, I hope that either side which has cause to shed them, whether the Normanby Committee or Messrs Thomson & McGuire,, will find in him, like the fair young bride in the ballad, a Royal Neil to wipe those tears away. In conclusion, myself and coadjutors would beg to reciprocate those friendly feelings which Mr Hursthouse has evinced in this discussion.—l am, &c.,

CHAS. E. GIBSON, Normanby, October,24, 1878.