The Waikato Times.

Waikato Times, Volume X, Issue 796, 24 July 1877, Page 2

The Waikato Times.

Qqualand exact justice to all men, Of whatever state or persuasion, religious or political # # # # #

Here shall the Prep-j the People's riglit maintain, Una wed by influence and unbribed by ga n

TUESDAY, JUDY 24. 1877

The rail-way from Auckland to Newcastle will be open for public traffic I to-morrow week. The continuation of this railway to the Waikato will be an undoubted benefit to the settlers, and will as certainly contribute largely to the increased profits of the Government in working the line, since the cost of doing so will not be proportionately increased with r.he augmented traffic receipts. The Government will save a large item j at once in the cost of coal, which will be obtainable on the line at the coal-mines for five shillings per ton. The demand, also, which will spring up for the Waikato coal in Auckland when the price is lowered, consequent on the reduction in cost of freight, will also largely increase the railway profits. The opening of he line is matter therefore for congratulation on all sides, and the event might, we think, be very ippropriately . commemorated in Newcastle after the usual fashion ot our countrymen, with a public, tinner. It is contemplated to run a trnin r,wice daily ea(;h way. The trains will leave Auckland for Newcastle it 7 a.m. and about 1 p.m., the former arriving in Newcastle at 12.30 p.m. and the latter about 6.30 p.m. The hours of departure from Newcastle to Auckland will oe the same. This, of course, will necessitate a re-afraugement of the coach' traffic. A complete re-distri-bution of the Waikato mail services

will be made. The' .can tractor, M l ' Carter, will run' big coach from Cambridge via Hamilton, daily, .so as -to arrive in Nq wcastle in time for the 1 p.m. up-train, returning at once for Hamilton and Cambridge with the up mails. So far, so good, but we would fain see a move made by the Government , in the direction of still further con-, tinuing the line. The patchwork construction which has so much characterised the New Zealand colonial railway, system has been a blot on our Public Works administration, disconnected lines— a piece here and a piece there, with a centre of population at one end and a swamp at the other— can never, in the nature of things, be expected' to pay. Actually, our railways have coat far less per. mile than those of any other Australasian Colony — as one to two and a-half in the case of .New South Wales, and even as onj to five in the case of ictoria; yet irom this very cause their qpn-sfci-uotion, though far less costly to theColony, is a greater burden to the population than is that of the more expensive railways of the two Australian Colouies mentioned to their inhabitants. We have stopped short at the rough work, and have neglectedto putforth Jjhe_fijaisbi n g 'siroKe wmcJr-wouTd~Eave givenTlTfe and motion co the scheme as a whole — have acted as the master of an extensive workshop would have done, who had erected an expensive engine and, for want of connecting 1 belts, continued to employ it on a single operation, instead of distributing its power throughout the premises. The colony has sunk six millions in its railways, and for the lack of the additional expenditure of about a fourth of the sum, the 'lines completed, like the engine of the workshop owner, are not utilised to a sixth of their power. And this is notably the case in this part of the colony. The opening of the railway -trom Auckland to Newcastle will be of great convenience to the Waikato as a matter of passenger traffic, but as affording an outlet for produce, arid giving thereby an impetus to settlement, it will effect nothing, As we have said on a former occasion, it comes up to Waikato, but not into it. Nor will it be, till the line is continued on to Te Awamutu and it can be fed with traffic from the cultivation which will spring up on either side of it, that it will really, to its fullest extent, benefit the district in convenience, and the colony in profit on its working. The same argument applies to the Thames Kiver Valley railway. Here is another work, for want of which, a magnificent country for settlement, and a large centre of population can neither benefit the other for want of the connecting link. Vet the whole cost of the Thames Valley railway would not amount to more than from £90,000 to ,£IOO,OOO, the engineering difficulties being so 'slight that the : average cost would not v foe more i than £3,000 per mile, or half the average cost of other New Zealand railways. Now, we have a large sum of money, say, for the 74 -miles of railway be i ween Auckland and Newcastle, at the average of .£6,000 per mile, over £400,000 expended— in what ? In bringing- up a railway to the extreme edge of an extensive tract of country which is awaiting settlement, when''continuing it on to Te Awamutu in the , one direction, and to the Thames in ■ another, WQizld be to thickly populate . and settle vast fertile tracts nearly as large as the whole of i.he cotmtry north of Auckland, and capable of carrying a population equal tQ that of the whole North Is. and told.