SHAVE AND SHOWER!

Auckland Star, Volume LIX, Issue 306, 27 December 1928, Page 9

SHAVE AND SHOWER!

NEW RAILWAY STATION.

FACILITIES FOR TRAVELLERS.

REFRESHMENT BRANCH SERVICE

Let travellers to Auckland take heart. Times of greater refreshment await them in the New Year.

Now, as almost everybody , knows, when a traveller comes from an overnight journey on the Main Trunk line with an appetite sorely in need of attention he must either join the cheerful company at the coffee stall or go beyond the precincts of the railway station for bodily sustenance. As for ablutions, well—he will probably find more extensive accommodation elsewhere.

Before the New Year ends passengers arriving at the new railway station in Auckland will have the choice of partaking of appetising breakfasts in a spacious dining-room or of light refreshments in an adjoining coffee and tea room. Not only this, but they will also have the pleasure of going to their meals with that gratifying feeling of personal cleanliness.

While madame will have been receiving assistance with her coiffure, her husband will actually have been able to take a shower and a shave. All thie is written down in the specifications for the grand new station which is to be erected in Auckland after many years of waiting.

This information was obtained to-day I from Mr. A. H. W. Evenden, ( district supervisor of the refreshment branch of the railways, by a pressman who set out to ascertain how the branch was succeeding in coping with the present holiday rush in the railway refreshment rooms and dining rooms. The story of the development of the refreshment bervice on the New Zealand railways is interesting. Former Dining Cars. Until a few years ago there were dining cars and facilities for afternoon tea on the Main Trunk expresses. When these facilities were discontinued the Department adopted the policy of providing adequate service for travelliers at railway stations along 'the line. At that time theft was a mere skeleton of a refreshment branch, but so great has been the development of the new method that to-day the branch has fully 400 permanent employees in the Dominion..

With the controller in Wellington (Mr. F. Lindsay) are associated an assistant] controller (Mr. H. A. anselow), an inspector for the Dominion (Air. A. L. [Smith), and three district supervisors.

[ "The demand on the railway diningrooms and refreshment rooms during the present»holiday season has been much heavier than last year," said Mr. Evenden, who had just s returned from visits of inspection to various parts of his district, extending as it does from Taumarunui in the south to Taneatua in the east and to Whangarei in the north. That travellers are appreciative of the general improvement which lias been effected in the refreshment service may be taken from the fact that in the course of a year there have not been more than two complaints.

Perhaps the average traveller does not know that the branch has its own bakeries. One of these is at Frank ton. At present, from two large ovens, it is turning out specially large quantities of bread, cakes and pies—;pies which at times run to a total of three figures daily. In the smaller centres goods are made on the station premises.

Coping with the Rush. "The staff in tlte refreshment room at Frank ton Junction is capable of serving 1100 cups of tea or coffee, with eatables, in ten minutes," said Mr. Evenden. "Time," he added, "is the essence of success in our work. In the dining-room at the same station 120 people are served at a sitting. The traffic department of the railways allows us •20 minutes in which to serve a meal, and we make oUr plans ffccordingly. In the work of the refreshment rooms we aim at coping with the maximum demand without interfering with the train timetable." A recent addition in the northern area is that of a refreshment countfer at Tauranga, the only one so far on the Bay of Plenty line. The patronage has I not been heavy, but it is expected to increase with the growth of traffic in that district. Another new undertaking has been the taking over by the branch of the bookstall on the Whangarei station. This i£ a matter more of expediency thait of policy, as where stalls are conducted to the satisfaction of the Department, and where lessees are forthcoming, they are left in private hands. Reverting to the subject of more adequate refreshment provisions in Auckland,' Mr. Evenden expressed the opinion that these would have materialised sooner but for the fact that the new railway station has for a long time been on the horizon. "When they do come," he added, "they will be as up-to-date as any io the Empire."