LESS AIR MAIL

Dominion, Volume 29, Issue 196, 16 May 1936, Page 10

LESS AIR MAIL

Decrease In Postings Last Week FOUR WEEKS TO RUN A decrease in postings for dispatch by air mail is recorded in the returns of the Post and Telegraph Department for last week, which was the first full week of operation of the new timetable between Dunedin and Palmerston North. The number of letters carried was 12,129, compared with 15,993 the week before and 12,402 the week before that. , Under the new timetable the northward plane leaves Dunedin at 8.15 a.m., three hours earlier than under the old schedule, so that letters reach Wellington at noon in time to go out in the afternoon deliveries, in the same way that Wellington letters for Dunedin leave at S o’clock and reach Dunedin in time for afternoon delivery The new northward timetable also provides quicker delivery to Wanganui and New Plymouth, the mails catching earlier trains at Palmerston North. Nevertheless the timetable has caused criticism, especially in Christchurch and more recently in Dunedin It is contended that the planes now leave those cities too early in the mornings for the service to be of material advantage for business correspondence. Some Wellington Chamber of Commerce members have also urged that the 8 o’clock closing of morning mails is too early for them, as they have not had time by then to read and reply to letters received in the steamer mail from the South Island. The experimental period of three months now has four weeks to run. Tiie Government will then have to consider whether the support given the air mail justifies the continuance of the service. So far the most enthusiastic supporters of the experiment have been the philatelists, whose heavy postings accounted for the high total of letters in tiie first week and also contributed to the increase in the seventh week, which was the week in which sales were first made of tiie Anzac stamps. The weekly totals of postings so Car have been :— First week 36,793 Second week 12,470 Third week 1-1,189 Fourth week 11,776 Fifth week 10,936 Sixth week 12,402 Seventh week 15,993 Eighth week 12.1211