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Auckland Star, Volume VI, Issue 1824, 20 December 1875, Page 2

The Kaipara railway furnishes some of the richest illustrations of railway management. Most readers know that it starts from the head of the navigation of a tidal river, and that consequently the steamer and trading boats on Kaipara can reach the terminus only on the top of the tide. Are the trains, therefore, made to suit the tide ? Oh dear no. " Such a thing was never heard of in England." The idea, indeed, of railway trains altering their time-table in accordance with the changes of the tide would be altogether shocking to the official mind. Three days ago some forty men, with their appurtenances, arrived by steamer'at Helensville on their way to Auckland. It was known they were coming, and of course that the steamer could arrive only at high water. Did the train wait ? Oh dear no. It had left at the fixed time an hour or two before, and as there is but a single train per day the party walked the fourteen miles to Riverhead. Such an occurrence is frequent. The empty carriages go to and fro as punctual as the chimes of the clock, and the steamers and sailing craft, which ought to be the feeders to the railway, deposit their passengers and goods of course only when they can, which is at high water. But who cares ? It would be infra cliff, for a Government institution like the railway to be subject to so paltry considerations. This is Centralism. This is Government from Wellington. If this railway w^re under Provincial control and directed from Auckland, the Manager would make the trains suit the tides Gr he would bo brought to tell the people the reason why. As it is, what are we to do ? Why grin and

bear it,