CORRESPONDENCE. THE POST OFFICE CHIMES

Taranaki Daily News, 22 September 1916, Page 6

CORRESPONDENCE.

THE POST OFFICE CHIMES

To tile Editor. S'ir, —It is interesting and amusing to lead that the Borough Council at it? last meeting resolved that the Post Office clock chimes should oe stopped between the hours of 11 p.m. and 0 a.m.in response to the request of .57 promi nent residents ot New Plymouth. "The residents complain of being awakened a< night by the chimes!" I suppose "the residents'' mean those visitors who, com merciallr bound, occasionally come to Xew Plymouth, and a few genuine residents, whose ill-fortune, or good-luck, as the case may be, it is to dwell in the vicinity of the Post Office. The latter shouhl surely by this time have become accustomed to the sound of the chimes. But what about the ten times 57 residents who have fcu fine accustomed to the. chimes and many of whom are dependent upon their daily bread for the clock to wake them —in summer— at 4 or 5 a.m. to enable them to know that it is time to arise? T can instance several cases of working men who practically depend upon the chimes to wake them, and the action of the Council, in thus "smooging" to a few : malcontents, who live in comparative luxury, will cause many a working man —ill as lie can afford it —to go to the expense of devoting a day's pay to the purchase of an alarm. Moreover, hundieds of residents outside the limited 100 yards radius of the Post Office spt their clacks by the chimes at midnight or about 5 a.m. It is absurd to say that because Wauganui and a few (very few) other places have stopped their chimes that New Plymouth should retrogress, and follow suit. What about the chief centres of the Dominion? Are their .Post Office chimes stopped for the convenience of 57 prominent residents? Or 570? Or 57C0? Furthermore, were not the chimes purchased by the ratepayers of New Plymouth? Therefore, why, at the request of o7 ''prominent" residents (mostly visitors) should the Borough Council interfere with the privilege of the rest of the hundreds who helped to instal them, and thus deprive ratepayers of what they contributed towards? And why should these hundreds of ratepayers who do not protest against the chimes be called upon to pay a farthing of the cost ( CIS) of stopping the so-called nuisance? There is a beautiful paradox, if one can take the newspaper reports of last Holiday's Borough Council meeting as correct. One councillor, who voted for stopping the chimes, said that he oelieved tliev were bound 'bv law to stop the power-house noise if complained of! Why did he not move to that effect? Why did he not move to stop church bells oil Sunday and every day in the week? Why did he not move to stop motor-'liorns honking? Or even railway engines whistling? These are every whit, and more, disconcerting to a sieeper's rest than the Post Office chimes, which everyone can speedily be accustomed to. 'lt was very apropos that at another stage of the proceedings apparently two members of the Council agreed with one another that unless some progress was made the Council •would soon be going into the Old People's Hume, and that it was resolved to travel a footpath thereto! —f am, FOR THE CHIMES,