KELBURNE TRAM. ACQUISITION BY COUNCIL.

Evening Post, Volume LXXVI, Issue 121, 20 November 1908, Page 2

KELBURNE TRAM. ACQUISITION BY COUNCIL.

KELBURNE RESIDENTS' .VIEWS, STATEMENT BY THE MAYOR. A deputation representative of the residents of the Kelburne and surrounding districts waited on the City Council last evening, to urge upon it tho desirableness of acquiring the KelburneKarori tramway Mr. J. P: Campbell was the spokesman, and he gave "utterance to remarks similar to those already published in The Post, in its report of the meeting at which the_ decision to appoint a deputation was* made.. In an address to the deputation, the Mayor said thdt the acquisition of the tramway was among the proposals already before the council's Tramways Committee, and to be submitted'to tho council. The delay in submitting it had been caused by delay in fulfilling a promise given by Mr. Wilson, secretary of the company, to supply a statement of what the company would require as compensation, up to the present time, if the line were taken over. Mr. Campbell ; I'm glad to hear the news. The Mayor, continuing, said that the return had been promised from week to week for the past six weeks or bo, and until it was received the council could not make progress in the matter, for it was necessary to know the exact shortage there would be, and what interest must be allowed for. There was to be considered— (l) Whether the line was to be acquired: (2) at what price; and (3) whether cost of acquiring was to be charged locally or over the whole city. His Worship also referred sto a, report published in a morning newspaper, and said that the Kelburne people had probably been misled by the report, which was unauthorised, incomplete in many respects, and misleading. It had not been supplied by any of the council officials, nor by himself. In his speech on behalf of the deputation, Mr. Campbell said that if the tramway was acquired before February next, the cost to the ratepayers concerned would be £8400 less than it would be at a later date. The Mayor asked Mr. Campbell if he could tell the council where to go to raise the required capital at 4 per cent. , Mr. Campbell hoped that in a very short time there would be no difficulty in raising the money. In a reference to the numbers of passengers carried last year, Mr. Campbell gave them as 918,813. " Councillor Bis"s enquired if the residents of Kelburne expected a reduction of fares with the taking over of the service by the corporation. Mr. Campbell replied that the passengers would like ( the fares reduced, but that would be a question for the council to consider afterwards. He thought, with tho increased traffic, that if the fares were reduced to one penny tickets — up and down — leaving strangers and others to pay threepence, that the differenos would not be very great, when the increased traffic was considered. A great many residents of Kelburne who walked to town would ride on the cars if the fares were reduced to one penny each way, They would .then increase the traffic. The Mayor observed that the only question was in arriving at how much the work cost? The council could not go on without making its calculations and obtaining official returns. It would endeavour to get some of this information in a day or two. Mr. Campbell thanked the council for* receiving the deputation, and then withi drew. A question as <to whether the City, Council should proceed by another route, in preference to acquiring the Kelburne tramway, was raised by Councillor Biss. He thought it woidd Be well if tho city engineer reported to the Tramways Committee on the point as to the capacity of Kelburne tramway. Councillor Biss thought it might be cheaper in the long run to make a separate tramway, for there was a doubt as to whether the carrying and motive capacities of the present system were capable of extension sufficient »to meet a probable large increase of traffic. The Mayor understood that the capacity of the engine was limited, but he understood that the carrying capacity was not. Councillor Biss thought the limitation applied to the whole system. The discussion then terminated. f