ACROSS THE PACIFIC.

Dominion, Volume 6, Issue 1790, 1 July 1913, Page 6

ACROSS THE PACIFIC.

NEW MAIL PROJECT.

TO LONDON IN 21 DAYS-

The accomplishment of tho journey from London to Winnipeg, a-distance of 3-400 , miles, in five days, is the object of « fast Government subsidised rail and steamship system which is planned to reduce the running time between Ixmdon and Sydney to 21 days. Twenty-six knot steamships of tho : Ivnapp type, having fined lilies and smal- > ler displacement than tho Mauretania, will run from Blacksod, a new harbour t on the north-west coast of Ireland, to Cape St. Charles, Labrador, in three days. ■ Thence to Winnipeg mails and passengers will be raced over an air-line railway - in another 36 hours, ■'and from the Manitoba metropolis they will be dispatched - with the utmost speed to the Pacific : coast. ; t . . Writing in the June issue of the "National Waterways' Magazine," an American publication, Mr. H. C. Plimmer says of the new project:—"Although conceivcd as a new medium of transportation between Britain and New Zealand and Australia, the "All-Red Routo' enters actively into consideration as a highway for distances that, while representing but a fraction of the grand total of mileage, are in themselves of great extent. From London to Winnipeg in five days is as important un» object relatively as the occomplishment of a twenty-one day sched.ulo between London and Sydney. This gieat highway through England, Scotland, and Ireland, across the Atlantic to Labrador, across British North America, over tho most northerly parallels of latitude yet followed by trunk line railways, and, diversely, across the Pacific to distant Kokohaina, Hong-Kong, and Shanghai, and to yet moro distant Auckland and Sydney, is planned to serve the purposes of war as well as the pursuits of peace. It will bo backed by the might and the combined resources of the United Kingdom, Canada, New Zealand' and Australia." A syndicate of leading financiers of England has let contracts for the commencement of construction work upon the line of railway, which is to connect Blacksod with tho northern cross-country routes, of the Irish railway system, terminating at Lame, on the North Channel, near Belfast, where car-ferry connection will be expected with Stranraer, on the Scottish coast, near Dumfries. Tne All-red Steam Ship Company, originally "planned to operate between Blacksod and Halifax, was incorporated under federal charter by the Canadian Parliament, in 1907, and this corporation will operate the steamship service between tho Irish port and Cape St. Charles, whence the airline railway is soon to bo constructed, under heavy Dominion subsidy, to Winnipeg. Inestimable social and l economical benefits to be derived by each of the territories which will be traversed by the Allred Route are predicted by the writer, who 9tates-.—"Australia and New Zealand, by the saving of almost a week in the journey to and from London, will derive manifest commercial advantages. Canada, in the words of Vioe-Admiral Sir Charles Campbell, of the British Royal Navy, must become, tho central province of the Empire, and the carrier of all tho traffic between the Australian colonies and the mother country.' Proportionately, however, Ireland must come to enjoy yet greater advantages. For the making of ■ the erstwhile lonely and' isolated Blacksod Bay, on tho Mayo county coast, the Atlantic terminus of the railway line from- London must bring about the concentration at that poiut of the. multitude of interests sure to I'ollow the sudden diversion thither of a traffic universal in its scope and gigantic in volume. Grain elevatoTS, coAl and oil storage, warehouses, and all tho equipment of a greater harbour terminus, whereto a vigorous and spreading population is sure to be attracted, will place Blacksod well in the, racß for maritime ~supremacy among the port cities of th«: British Isles. The consequent effect upon the industrial position of the North Irish country, of ■which Blacksod ivill be the logical vgateway, is obvious."