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Taranaki Daily News, Volume LV, Issue 271, 8 April 1913, Page 4

TIIK OI'UXAKE RAILWAY. The great importance attached to the decision of the Government in connection with arriving definitely at the point which the Opunake railway will leave the main line impels 11s to again refer to the matter. Whatever-decision the Minister for I'ublic Works, together with the Cabinet, may arrive at it may be taken for granted that the outcome will be the result of taking a broad view of the position. There is little, doubt that, from what the Prime Minister and the .Minister for Public Works intimated Mile at Stratford, that they would be guided to a great extent by the report of the Taranaki Western Railway Commissioners, and it is with this in view ■we again approach the subject. As the position now stands, the Hon. Mr. Massey and the Hon. Mr. Fraser have intimated that in so far as the Moturoa part of the line is concerned, if the (!overmnent cannot build the line, the settlers will be allowed to build it themselves. The junction of the southern portion of the railway is recommended bv the Commissioners to be at Te Roti in the first place, and at a later date a junction at Stratford. Tn asking that the Stratford portion of the line should be started simultaneously with Te Roti, the Stratford people are making a reasonable claim, but it is more than probable that the Government will not at this juncture entertain starting the line at two points, that is, Stratford and Te Roti. At whatever point the line starts at the southern end, the destination of nroduce. once it reaches the main line to a port for shipment, must necessarily decide, or at least have very great weight in deciding, whether Stratford or Te Roti is the more suitable junction. The recent experience of shippers at the port i:f Pa tea does not tend to give shippers confidence in that port for reliability in getting produce away. Patea as a port has served its purpose well under circumstances that have obtained in the past, but when in a very short time the port of Moturoa will permit of oceangoing liners trading here, conditions will be entirely altered. So far from the port point of view. Stratford being nearer Xew Plymouth, and the fact of the. line juni-tioning at Stratford, while at the same time connecting the western railway with the Stratford Main Trunk line, the latter place would undoubtedly be the more suitable for the junction. Now let us consider, with the junction at Stratford, how the settlers on the Waimate Plains would be served. Let it be said that such is the importance of lifting the traffic from the main roads 011 the plains, that it would be an iniiKtiec to those settlers for anv proposition to be carried out that would not relieve them in that direction. Yerv , well. What appeals to us as being the right thing to do is to make the junction at Stratford (which is already the junction for the Main Trunk line). iar,-»' the line through Kaponga to thence westward, following the route of the proposed Te Roti line to Opnnnkp. From Kapuni the line could lie coatinred south to Manaia. The proposal as set out, would serve the whole of the wintry from Stratford downward through the plains, and the only departure from the Commissioners' recommendations would be the elimination of about eight miles of the proposed Te Roti route westward from the main Hne, and the ' country through which this portion o'f 1 the line would run would be well served

by the present main line in conjunction with the Stratford deviation. Furthermore, the suggested route would do away for all time with two junctions as suggested by the Commissioners, and would have the, added merit of not disturbing the continuity of the line round the mountain to Moturoa.