GET OUT OF THE MUD.

Taranaki Daily News, Volume LII, Issue 143, 14 July 1909, Page 4

GET OUT OF THE MUD.

(To the Editor.) Sir,—lt doesn't seem to matter irora what quarter you get country news, one note is universal—tlie roads are almost impassable; yet neither engineers, councillors, nor correspondents seem to have any idea of trying a method wiucli would probably enable the work of the country to be done at one-third of the labor and cost. It. is a pity I haven't the power and authority of my old schoolmaster, or a lot of the abovementioned folk would have an uuun> fortable " sit upon" till they could spell M telpherage," and be able 10 give some account 01 it and say what can be done with it, not only in opening up new country, but as a means ot currying traffic cheaply wliere railways are not to be got for the present. A musu confess'that before writing tills it was my intention, to have collected a lot oi indigestible food in the shape of cost of road formation,. cost of metal per mile, cost per mile to keep in repair, with all the necessary bridges, culverts, etc., which have to be found betore a road is passable; next, to take a certain block of road, say, from Pungaremi to Moturoa, and calculate the amount of trail'ie in tons to be carried over that road and the price per ton. Of course this cost is additional to the cost | of road-making, repairing, etc. Tot it] all up, even without allowing for acci- \ dents, delays, and the hundred and one vexatious trifles always occurring where the, present crude facilities are in vogue, and then see what it costs each farmer in the district to simply transport his produce to his nearest approachable mar ket. A spell of bad health, and t.io i persistent attentions of Wragge's ragged rascals, 11 Taylor," " Davenport," etc., prevented nie from working a lot 01 these costs up; hut if this is successful in stirring up some more able champion, so much the better. Now, the practice of " telpherage" is no new thing, an r l, curiously enough, is almost invariably applied where a difficult piece of work requires doing. How often and how long has the wire rope been the first means of crossing dangerous gorges aid rivers on the West Coast? s Tis true, they were generally put up and in use before .th 6 Government engineer was sent to interfere, but that did not de tract from their utility. Au excellent object lesson might have been seen in the playground of the Christchurch Exhibition, though for some reason very, little notice was taken of the aeriai | tramway that was to be seen theiv. Yet that same two or three hundieo j yards of wire rope should have been! a lesson to every visitor interested in | opening up country cheaply and easily; for one thing, it had been proved, i.e., making possible the bridging of the famous Staircase Gully on the West j (Joast railway, a gully which for years had been pronounced unsurveyablc even, and which without the aid of telpher-1 age would hardly have been bridged yet.! Again, a coal ship meets a large steamer in mid-ocean, where neither can be expected to be particularly steady, and in 1 a few hows, by the aid of telpherage, the eargo of coal is transferred from 1 one to the other, though hundreds ol I 1 yards may separate them. So it Is no wild-cat scheme wc have to consider, j If some practical out-of-door engineer could rub the mud out of his eyes, r»e would easily work out details; 'but he must not be a Government man, pledged j to import every post, have it squaieJ. planed, painted, and a picture made of it, or we are in the quicksands at one.'. What is wanted is first to ascertain the cost, say, on the line from Opunako to New Plymouth, of water-power for electricity on the route or cost of steam-power at Moturoa,if cheaper, cost of posts (say 25 to the mile), cost of wire, cost of trucks or carriages calculated to carry two tons or a dozen passengers each, platforms at various factories, and convenient stopping - t vivi crossing places, etc. Observe, "there would probably be no necessity to buy land to run the line over or to keep •nvwhere near the main road, except t.t> „ r el to factories, as the line could be run over the tops of fences. Very few farmers would want to charge much for the! right to cross their farms, and r>o the line of easiest grade or shortest route could be taken as may be thought best. Jam aware, sir. all this is very crude, and will probably raise only a laugh or a sneer according to the Visposition of the reader: yet, if it sets some abler mind on the track, my s r nare will.have been well done. That the plan is feasible for a line to run short trains 8 or fl miles an hour T am pretty sure of. Tf 100 miles an hour is required, the day of the rigid line and easy grade must be waited for, as well n's the day when the Moturoa grading works shall put up a record, running 10H0 tons of butter over her own wire to the Home liner Gothic lying at the wharf..—l am, etc., W. ROSSITEIi. (