PATEA COUNTY MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1881. OUR RAILWAY.

Patea Mail, 22 February 1881, Page 2

PATEA COUNTY MAIL PUBLISHED Tuesday, Thursday, and Saturday. TUESDAY, FEBRUARY 22, 1881. OUR RAILWAY.

Rails and plates for the Patea harbor section of railway are ready to be shipped to this port, to be laid on the permanent way by the contractors, Messrs Downes and Proctor. The Government have invited tenders for the freight of 200 tons from Wellington to Patea, the tenders closing yesterday. As this harbor section of railway, just over half a mile long, must be completed within a few months, under penalty for delay, the public will wonder more and more what was the object of making this bit of railway, with a gap of 10 miles on the south side and 18 miles on the north. If it had been intended to start from Patea as a centre convenient for freighting the railway material, and working in both directions to join the Waverley and Hawera ends, that policy should have been made clear by continuing the work. This harbor railway of only half a mile seems to have been the result either of a quarrel between Ministers or of a wasteful want of policy. Was it seriously intended that this bit of railway should be worked before the other ends reached Patea, or was it intended as a mocking concession to the railway petition which the Patea district presented to Parliament early last session? It is a mockery because, while you call it a local railway, it is of no use to the locality. Patea is put off with a sort of Taranaki adroitness. We asked for a railway which had been repeatedly promised, and for which money had been more than once voted, and we get just as much of a railway as can be seen with the naked eye—a railway half a mile long—nay a few yards over half a mile. Patea is puzzled at this, because it is privately assured that a great effort, a very great effort, was required from the zealous member for Egmont to get this Patea railway conceded by the Ministry. Great efforts are expended, it seems, on things which can be of no use. What effort has ever been made, by any political representative of this district, to get us a single thing that could be of use ? Will somebody point it out ? The line has been or was to be reisurveyed between Waverley and Patea, to test whether a better route could be found on the seaward side of the main road, joining on to the harbor line near the Station, and so utilising the Patea section as part of the main line. It will be interesting to be informed of the result of this re-survey. The line northward from Patea is levelled up to Manutahi, except a few small cuttings left unfinished by the “ unemployed.” If the length up to Manutahi were ballasted and laid with rails, this length of seven miles would not suffice for a local line to work an engine. A local line for Patea is impossible. The line must piece up with the Hawera or Waverley end before the money already sunk in this bit of line, say £IB,OOO, can be utilised for earning a revenue. The short length to Waverley, about 9 miles in a direct line, would place this district in connection with all the coast towns to Foxton. Only eleven miles of permanent way remain to be levelled to connect with Hawera, though part of this is tunnelling. The gap between these two working ends is so short, and so much of that work is already done, that another appeal to Parliament would be the only sure means of drawing atten-

tion to the smallness of the unfinished link, and to the importance of a continuous line along the West Coast from Waitara to Foxton. Why should not another effort be made to call the attention of Parliament to this matter ? Our appeal last year obtained some response. Try again. It appears to us that a public meeting might be held with advantage shortly before Parliament meets. Some good would come of it. Having no direct political voice inside the House, this district should speak for itself by petition. For political purposes we are tacked on to Taranaki, and it cannot reasonably be said this district has a voice in Parliament. Facts contradict that every session. When our interests clash with Taranaki, as they generally do, we are sacrificed invariably. But we can cry aloud from without, and make Parliament hear. ——