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Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 241, 1 March 1913, Page 8

(Continued from page ~i), of woi'k wo propose to do, so that our . total cost per mile would probably lx> ll%d. or a total annual cost of .(jkiti). Some of yon may object, to the comparison with Wnnganui owing to that town being so much larger limn New Plymouth. It was not so when they installed the trams, as their population was estimated at 11000. Wanganui has extended rapidly since the inauguration ol" the trams. Likewise so has Invercargill, and so will New Plymouth. Now, the last objection I have to deal I with is the personnel of the Council.] This cannot possible be an objection, as the present Council go out of office next month, and the matter is in the hands «f the residents. Speaking for myself, I would resign now rather than jeopardise the present loan. I think it deadly unfair and unjust to use this line of argument against a proposition of such vital importance to the town. The route and system are definitely decided upon and the whole work will be carried on under the supervision of experts. The actual councillors will not have a great deal to do with it if they accept the advice of those they pay to advise. This argument is mere piffle, and is more an I insult to our consulting engineer, who I believe is now recognised as one of the leading authorities in New Zealand on these matters. In conclusion, I appeal to the ratepayers to lift New Plymouth out of the ruck and put the town in the position it should hold. The prospects here are better, but the progress is less than nearly every other town in New Zealand. A lot of this is because of-the apathy of our citizens towards improving the town by a progressive policy."

MR. BKWLEY

Mi . W. Lewley took the platform in oppowtion to the proposal. At the outset he pointed out that in all his newspaper letters he had invariably placed the matter of road improvement before advocating a service of motor buses. He thought tin-1 a mistake was being made by the advocates of the system by trying to draw a "red herring" across the track in making it a question of motorbuses versus tramways. He opposed it for four reasons. The first of these was the inadequacy of water supply. This had not been touched upon by the speakers that evening: The view he had always taken was that there was not sufficient power ;in the Waiwakaiho to supply both the electric light power Station and the water for consumption in the town. Digressing for the moment

Mr. Bewley took the Council to task for not having placed sufficient information 1 before the ratepayers "in order to enable them to adjudicate on the proposals in time for the polling day. "Here we are," he said, "only.-four-days, hefore ihe poll, and we are expected to be. in a positior to criticise the figures theyiiave put before us to-night, and make up our minds in four days. : I consider that in that matter the'Cquncil has failed in its dutj in not calling the. meeting-earlier. It looks as if it has been purposely put off to avoid criticism earlier." Mr. Bewley then pointed, f.the.fuur points on which the .opponents, -of -thc-K'heme based their .opinions,,; wiere.s—(l) iThc miestion of water power; 1 (2)-the rais\w, of the loan; . (3) there was no urgency; (4) 'the ;faot: that.; there was mot sufficient-population to justify the installation of tramways at present. Enlarging on the prospective, insuflieiency of the water 'supply.' the speaker said that he based . his convictions on Mr. Climie's report to the Council, in- thai he estimated' that the Waiwakaiho contained 875 h.p. At the present time the town water supply and the electric, light works were absorbing 400 h.p. Roughh speaking, «bou;t, (50; per . cent, of ■ the people were, using : the ".'electric, light, which was becoming, jnore po.pular, every day. By the time, ,ithe| population had doubled—and, that, (Jay• was not so very far distant—probably from 90 to 101 per cent, would, be,;electric light Consumers. To cope, with fhi.s cousumpt/or the Borough .would require from 1000 to 1200 h.p. W,her.e was .it coming from —not out of the.Waiwakaiho! If there was not sufi'iciejit ,wa and there was no surplus for .tramways,it , would b( more profitable, for. the ;Borough to sell the power as-electric light—not a cur-, rent for tramways.../J.'he..ne,xt, point was the question, of the raising of ,the loan. There was no. r jios*iib.ility of raising it i for a year. There'was-'no urgency for [the trams. X.o:,urgeucy for., moving our j population,, for . we '..'had scarcely any population. t.p move, The. tendency nowadays was to say, "I want a, th-ing," not .."Can 1 pay for "liV .'pomparing New Plymouth with , •Wanganui;, there was 1 , more ])opulation, more, industries; more workers, more, tourists,,and people trad r . ing in from 1 a bigger area, as there were no small towns'ielpie. to iit as r h'ere. Mr. Bewley said ; tlistt; he; had. previously shown a loss of :£l«3Jl.'• 'Wanganui had a population, of hv.OOQ <or IG;ooo'served by the tramways whieh'gaVe 1 a 'revenue, on trams of ];is -Id per head, not f'l Is'2d' as staled by the Mayor. Taking the liberal estimate of -New 'Plymouth's population at 5250, the loss would be 1 £1512.1 in addition to £155!), or a total loss of £3071 .He had allowed.for the extra estimated revenue of '£loo,' ami£2oo for ad-] vertising fn the cars. But our popula-| tion was not. yet 8250: • ft was onlvi 7500 all told, and much' of the 7500 was of no use to the trams. Taking the population at 0000i'tlft^ossi.would bo| £3571, based on Wiinganni figures. In, addition, they had to pav the sinking fund at '/.per cent., .filOO'a 'year. These figures were simply appalling, 1 but they were the possibilities. Mr. Bewley quot-, ed letters and reports' in support of motor 'buses,, and suggested the early disappearance of the electric "'trams, Many of the English tram companies were now running motor buses, mainly because they made for inexpensive testing of revenue from new traffic routes. ■ The electrical engineer at Dunedin had recommended a service of petrol'driven 'buses. Mr. Bewley said he was not going to argue motor-bus versus trams, although he could have refuted several; statements just made. The Mavor pointed out. and Mr Howley admitted, that the sinking fund of '/.per cent, would amount to £275, not £llOO. OTHER. SPEAKERS . Mr. F. W. Fagan. as a ratepayer still, and with the intention of coming back

lo live here. >,aid he lli<r,ig!i! (he !o-.:i proposals shouiii be doubled. We wan. I cd good roads. U'o ;. ,i good metal, an,. \ gi/od labor, but we put down ■•darned I I'ollen road-."' If there were as good: road surfacis here as in Ltmduii, \.'oUid they still advocate trams? A Voice: What would it cost, Mr. Fagan continued that oil, the harbor, and the natural attractiveness of New I'lymoulh would double its population soon. How the dickens could they supply electric light to the people then, if they had trams as well'/ A Voice: Tap it higher up. (Laughter). Mr. C. E. f'ellringer said that the objections urged against the water supply would fall to the ground. There was any amount ol water to be obtained U'rom the mountain stream. The cost lof trams would be heavy, but they had to make a move. When the change from the pumping to the gravitation water scheme and electric light were proposed people grumbled that this would cripple the town; years since belied, lie congratulated Cr. Clarke on the presentment of his case, which had removed some of the speaker's doubts. As for the ability of the Council to carry out the scheme, no Council wotdd ever be deemed capable of doing it. (Laughter). If the Councillors hadn't the confidence pf the people, let the geniuses turn them out and take charge. (Hear, hear). As for opportunity, we had to make the time opportune by united effort. If there were a spirit of optimism pervading the town it must go ahead. Coining to the scheme itself, he thought 'a rail system must be adopted. If other schemes were perfected, only the overhead gear would be "scrapped," and this cost only £1001) a mile. The proper course to pursue now was to carry the loan proposals, and if the ratepayers wanted, better men to put them through then the opportunity would come.. in April next.

Mr. F. W. Snndford said he had seen 'buses succeeded by horse trams,,these by steam trams, and these by electric trams, which gave the first relief'to the ratepayers. Trains would save the roads, save the cost of upkeep, and give suburban ratepayers a-chance of getting in and out of town quickly. °

Gr. TV. Ambury said" he was sure the ratepayers were '"out for town improvements and trams," and ho was satisfied the result of the poll on Wednesday would surprise some of the' "croakers." As for Mr. Bewley, had that gentleman continued for another five minutes iie would have proved that all the revenue of the trams would be loss. ( Laughter). He-supported the expert, Mr. ?. Black —who devoted bis whole life to this work for- communities in all' parts of the Dominion—against the amateur. He was not satisfied with Mr. Bewley's figures. Trams would make ttieir'Wn'traffic. As for the wealth of Wanganui; ;it was "not-; the- wealthy people who marie theTtrams.'a success, but "us" poor beggars, who have to work:" Mr. Bewley and the wealthy folks generally ] used motor cirs.- •

t Mr. Bewley: Don't be personal; that's] ffot argument. A penny' rate would cover "any loss that could possibly be made on the 1 trams. If half the population spent Is a week it would cover all j the expenses. ' '■ ]

Mr. E. Griffiths said that this big meeting was the outcome (if Mr. Bewley's advocacy of' motor 'buses, lie was opposed to Mr. Bewley in the matter. He mentioned that trams kept a given track whilst 'buses dodged and skidded and slipped;, that Xew Plymouth had a. tremendous holiday traffic that Wanganui had not. as instance the school picknckers: ami that benzine was going up in price.

Mr. .John Venle (Auckland) • was'surprised that there should be any- opposition to 'trams'. He pointed to the enormous iucrei'sp of value accruing l to-prop-, ■er'ty' in : Auckland and Wellington sub; lirbs from tram installaion. and the increase of population that must;come. It was-not the leisured class; but the'workers' wlio used (lie tram's,' and built up the values. ' ■'■ ■■

I . TIIK KXPKRT'S VIEWS.•.: /. . J Mr. F. Black, as consulting engineer. j to the Council, traversed'some of the criticisms levelled at the scheme by speakers that night. He went on to say that it had been stated that in'-.h. few years time the overhead system would he obsolete. He controverted this contention. ' In lSilli be had witnessed the opening of the London to Bristol overhead system and the same cry was rais.ed then. That was 17 years ago, and the day when the system would be ."scrapped" as obsolete was.as far-off as f ver - Touching upon the remark made by Mr Bewley that it would pitv the Council'beteer to sell current for'lifting at-approximately Bd per' unit, than as po W er. for tramways at approximately d per unit. Mr. Black pointed out that it was difficult to explain'to the layman that the latter current' cost so anncli less to produce. Current sold for power was m a sense for wholesale pur- | poses, and did not involve extra heavy j loads at certain hours during the da v. ' The cost was thus considerably less. Mr Black added that Mr. Bewley's references to the revenue per capita of the | tramway population in Wanannui weve .erroneous, in that the population of .that town was not really 15.000. but 11,000. Tt was true that the population jof.Wangamii and surrounding districts . fed by the tramway .scheme to-day was 15,000, but it was not 1.5..000 duriii" the earlier period of the Wanganui system,. The original scheme (upon which the f Council's estimates were based) comprised only 5 miles, which served a population of 11,000. Ilien, again. Mr. Bewley had made a point of the electrical' engineer's recommendation Jto introduce motor 'buses to Dunedin., but it would probably be found that these were only to act as feeders for the tramways. He understood from the manager himself that this was so. Mr. Fagan had asked whether the Council would adopt motor 'buses if New Plymouth lnuk as good | roads as London. If the Council was in | a position to bring their roads up to' the London standard motor 'buses might possibly be worthy of consideration. The difficulty was that the London roads cost about ten times as much as any Borough Council in Xew Zealand could afford. The London roads, good as they were, could not carry motor 'buses without being torn up in an unexampled manner. As regards the contention that

(here was an insulVicicnc-v of watov in tlic Waiwakaiho In cope with a tramwav service, the speaker said that it was immaterial. .Mr. (Tunic, however, had made certain recommendations 'to the Council which would considerably increase the water power available, and even supposing this fell sliort of the required (|iiotii auxiliarv ])ower could be installed, lie referred to a new typo of engine which was rapidly coming to the ■fori 1 .and which was just as cheap as water-power. The resolution was then put and carried. Mr. Bewley's "No" being the only audible dissent.