AUSTRALIAN RAILWAY

Shannon News, 8 March 1927, Page 4

AUSTRALIAN RAILWAY

FROM NORTH TO SOUTH,

In the heart of the Australian Continent last Friday a simple ceremony marked the honouring of a 20-year-old promise to the South Australian State and people by the Commonwealth Government. The ceremony was the turning of the first sod of a line of railway at Ooduadatta, the terminus of the South Australian railway northwards, to link up with Alice Springs, the terminus of the Northern Territory line southwards from Darwin. The promise was one given by the Federal Ministry of 1906 to South Australia that in exchange for the transfer of control of the Northern territory, then a portion of South Australia, from the State to the Commonwealth, the north-south transcontinental line would be completed. The distance between the two present termini is 291 miles. Oodnadatta is in the middle of the vast, dry, silent interior. In spite of its dryness this country is declared by those who know it to be capable of profitable development and production. The special train bearing Federal and State politicians to the scene of the ceremony saw plenty of evidence that the efforts of man could turn this apparently arid region to blossoming plains, and residents aver that the linking of Oodi nadatta and Alice Springs by rail will mean much in the development not only of the present settled districts, but also of others where cattle and sheep rearing has not yet been attempted. The actual ceremony of turning the sod was witnessed by a" little group of local residents and railway gangers. The weather was cool, but a roaring wind scoured the bare brown plains and sent the dust swirling round the speakers and audience. In the background aborigines beamed at the proceedings. The bells of a camel team jangled and a little group of Afghans, drivers of the camels, watched, with who knows what feelings, the beginning of a work that will make their camels out of date. No fewer than eleven speeches were made at the ceremony. The Federal Minister for Works, Mr W. C. Hill, said that the line would cost, excluding rolling stock, £1,700,000, and would be completed not later than June 30, 1929. The principal advantages claimed for the new railway link are that it will prove' an additional means of defence in a time of war, it will tend to unite the people of south, north and central Australia, and it will be the forerunner of a definite attempt to provide a water supply and other facilities 1 which would make for the settlement and development of the interior of the continent.