WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1920. A WORK THAT MUST NOT WAIT

Dominion, Volume 14, Issue 63, 8 December 1920, Page 6

WEDNESDAY, DECEMBER 6, 1920. A WORK THAT MUST NOT WAIT

* The Central Progress League dcsorves to be congratulated on its efforts to secure an early commencement upon the work of providing a new railway station yard at Wellington. As the Government railway experts have repeatedly affirmed, this work is of extreme urgency. The erection of the new station building which Wellington rather badly needs may wait until times have somewhat improved, and more pressing demands have been satisfied, but an up-to-date railway yard is,needed in order that a great ami growing traffic may be handled efficiently and with reasonable economy. It is needed not as a city convenience, but in the interests of all sections of the extensive area served by the most important port and shipping centre in the Dominion. Six years ago, Mn. E. H. Hiley (then General Manager of Railways) stated that tho terminal accommodation at Wellington (as well as in somo other centres) was "altogether insufficient for present and 1 future requirements," and that neither of the Wellington stations was laid out in 8, manner conducive to

economical or expeditious handling, "having been added to and patched as increasing traffic has necessitated." The present method of working (ne added) is inconvenient to tho public, whilst it is impossible for tho Department to deal with the traffic satisfactorily. It is estimated that the traffic to be handled in Wellington will, at the present rate of progress, double itself in less than ten years, and as tho stations are now taxed to the utmost, at busy periods, it is clear that'no time should he lost in providing the increased accommodation in a central position.

Naturally conditions arc very much worse now than when Mn. Hiley reported in these terras. The railway terminal facilities of the Dominion's chief port are still' in the unsatisfactory state he described, and the Government, instead of energetically forwarding the necessary improvements, is apparently pursuing a policy of drift. This policy is the more inexcusable in the absolute contrast it affords to the lavish expenditure of public money that is at present being made on development and other works in Auckland province. AYc have no sympathy with the parochial outlook which condemns Government expenditure on a big scale in a particular area'simply because it exceeds the expenditure that is being made simultaneously in other parts of the Dominion. A comparison of recent and current expenditure in' Auckland' with the continued neglect and postponement of a vitally urgent and necessary work lik'o the construction of an up-to-date railway yard -in Wellington certainly suggests, however, that there is something in the charge that the northern province is being unduly favoured. Something will be done to remove this impression if the preliminary works whioh must precede tho actual reconstruction nf the terminal facilities are at onco put in hand. The Government has full power to complete the necessary arrangements with tho City Council and Harbour Board, and will incur undivided responsibility for anv further delay. _ Expedition is the more necessary since it seems certain.in any casethat the work must extend over a period of years, and that before they can be supplemented the inadequate facilities available will be much more severely taxed than they are at present. When the Railway's Estimates were under discussion last session, Mn. 11. A. Wright, M.P., stated that it would take seven years to reconstruct the Wellington railway terminus, and apparently this estimate was accepted by the Government. Two years are allowed for the construction of a sea-wall, which will ultimately enclose a reclamation of 65 acres east of Thorndon Quay and the Hutt Koad. Under the scheme- prepared by Mn. Hu.ey in 1914, it was proposed to establish the new goods yards on existing land—that is to say, he proposed to "jirovide mode/in facilities for traffic, handling without waiting for the reclamation of the additional 65 acres. His idea was that the goods yard could be transferred at a. later date to the new reclamationits lay-out being thus straightened and improved—and that the Department would then be able to dispose of a valuable area situated between 'the reclamation and Thorndon Quay. He estimated that under his plan postponing the larger part of the reclamation to a future date, five years would be spent in completing the new station and .yarcjs. Under the plans now approved by the Government the whole of tho reclamation will be completed at the outset, and though this means that the goods yard will be laid out to tho best advantage, it may easily mean also an addition of more than two years to the period in which Mb. Hilei p estimated that tho reorganisation of the terminal • facilities could be carried out. All sitch questions, of course, must be determined in accordance with expert advice, but the change in plans which lengthens the time that wilj be taken to complete tho work makes it all the more imperatively urgent that it should be nut in hand without any further delav. It is clear that under tho most favourable eir< cumstances tho scrioun difficulties, already experienced in handling railway traffic in and out of Wellington will bs heavily intensified long before the new station yard is completed. It is equally evident that tho Government's present inaction and delay in this matter are flatly' at variance with the emphatically stated advice of its own experts. Before leaving office, Mn. Hiley repeatedly urged the absolute necessity of overtaking as rapidly as possible the 1914 programme of improvements, and which the provision of modern terminal facilities at Wellington was a conspicuous item. In his 1919 report he declared that delay in effecting those improvements raiced the prospect of "serious congestion, if not complete disorga-nisaton of business." This Yarning is nowhere of greater weight than as it applies to the. reorganisation of terminal faciliticFat Wellington.