EAST TO WEST.

Evening Post, Volume LXXXIII, Issue 151, 26 June 1912, Page 16

EAST TO WEST.

! MAIN TRUNK AND TARANAKI. PROGRESS OF RAILWAY TO ALONG THE LINE OF ROUTE. (By Our Special Reporter.) It is a very round about way one has to go at present to get from Auckland to Taranaki by rail. There is the journey along the Main Trunk to Marton, 310 miles, and then the double-black to New Plymouth 141 miles, so that the total distance one has to cover in a train between Auckland and New Plymouth ia 461 miles, or 34 miles further than it ie between Auckland and' Wellington. At the same time the sea routs ntxm Onehunga to New Plymouth is considerably less thftii a third of this. Clearly 'then some shortening of the railway .journey ie needed and thie will come sooner or lateiv-it all depends on the rate of construction — in a' railway be« tween tho Main Trunk and .Taramtki across the hundred miles of country that separatee the two. ALREADY PARTLY OPEN. This railway is actually in progress now — in fact it has been in progress at one > end at any rate for eleven years, so it may be fiaid to date back to the stone age of the Main Trunk. Already it is open 23 miles from Stratford, and the rails are laid over a doaen miles further on into Whangamomona on tho western border of the Main Trunk country. At the other end after long delays due to the old, old cause — local quarrels and rivalries ac to routes and junctions a start has been made near Te Koura between Taumarunui and Ongartte about 168 milee from Auckland and 258 from Wellington. The name of the junction ie at present Okahukara. The distance between Okahukara and Stratford is approximately 95 miles, of which about forty are actually constructed at the Taranaki end as far as Whangamomona, leaving between fifty and sixty, on which little or nothing has been done to be built to fill in the gap. Therefore it will be some years before the short cut from the Main Trunk to Taranaki is available for traffic. VALUABLE FOR SETTLEMENT. Though not a line of genuine national importance, such as the Main Trunk was, it will be an extremely .valuable line for purposes of settlement. In fact, in its hundred miles course from Okahukara to Stratford it will open ujj a vast area of land of decidedly better quality than rules on the central hundred and fifty miles of the Main Trunk. It is in great proportion papa country, rough, but fertile, and capable of carrying fairly heavy stock. The average elevation of the line will be low — under 1000 ft at the highest pomt — and the climate is far from being so severe- as il is on the inland high plateaus of ' the Main Trunk. The- whole country, with the exception of a dozen miles at the Main Trunk end, is, or has been, thickly bushed with the Bub-tropical vegetation of the Wanganui River type. In general character it follows the well-known features of the upper waters of the Wanganui, along the chief tributaries of which the Ohura and the Tangarakau it takes its general course WILL PAY ITS WAY. It follows, then, that the chief value of the east and west line from the Main Trunk to Taranaki will be in the direction of promoting settlement rather than of establishing through communication, though that, of course t is an important consideration. The Main Trunk was to join Auckland and Wellington; the east and west line — the Great Central and Western of the North Island, as it would probably be called, if a private line — will link not only Auckland witu New Plymouth, but all Taranaki, as far as Wanganui, with the Northern Main Trunk country. As a pioneering and as a through railway it, therefore, merits attention from the authorities as, of first-rate importance. It is a line that will probably pay its way all along, through the increase in trade with the spreading settlements and, perhaps, with the large coal fields known to extend in a wide belt across the country in a direction north and south. Ab a commercial proposition it is a promising line; as an engineering problem, aB will be eeen later, it presents some difficulties. THROUGH ROUGH COUNTRY., Much of it is very rough country— in fact, from tho time the railway strikes the papa, some miles to the Stratford side of WhangamomonA, until it« i^ets out of it, at about Matire, fifteen mileß from the other end, ib is bvokett all tho way after the manner of papa formation. It looks like a huge troubled sea of mud suddenly petrified in the height of a stovm into a choppy turmoil of created waves. It i» only when the bush comes off the land that its true ruggedness of contour is properly visible, as, for instance, all round 'Whttngamomoiia. Here one gets tho typical ra«orba«k, pinnacle, and steeple country, rolling in o. succession of irregular waves to the utmost horizon. Such country is quit^ practicable for grazing—in fact, it is almost better «o for. sheep, and tho farmer gets a. good deal more than 10C acres of surface for tho 100 ttci'Ofi ho leases or purchases on the survey plans. But io is not easy country foi* the railwuv constructional engineer. TUNNELS AND VIADUCTS. A further difficulty of building this line lien in the fact that its course takes it generally arrow a> bor'wß of tributaries of the Wanganui, m that it has' to bridge deep gorges and tunnel dividing ridges. Part of this haft already been experienced on the way out to Whangamomqna^--thenceforth to be called the Whanga, a* locally, for short. Tho railway crosted the watersheds of the Patea. tlio Waitava, and the Whangaiuomona, a tributary of the Wanganui. Jt will have to- cross further divides 1 between the Tungarakuu. Ohura, and Ongaruo, not to mention minor btrcams, before ib reaches tho Ma-in Trunk, fine, bjg tunnel lia,& already

hod to bo pierced before tho lino could get through to Whangi*, and at Tahora there aro two more to be made before tho railway can got into the Tangarakau Gorge, and then there will be otlwre before ib reaches Ohura, and, lastly, there iij one of nearly a mile in length, between the h«ad waters of Ohura and the Ongaruo at Okahuka-ra. These tunnels will delay tho lino considerably. TREACHEROUS PAPA. lo tine must be added the difficulty of building a, railway through the treaclieroua ptvpa, the true nature of which was experienced to the full on the southern part of the' Central Main Trunk between larttngarere and Mangaonoho. On tho east and west line it will be even woree, for the- country is more precipitous and the rainfall heavier. Papa when exposed to the atmosphere absolutely melts away in a. sticky mud and conies down in huge slips. In a dry state it ie tough and hard and slow stuff to cut through. Forty or fifty miles of this on the sides of steep gorges and in, deep fills will give the engineer & good deal of trouble to negotiate. Again, transport ie a terrible handicap in this country, as there is no metal for twenty or thirty—sometimes fifty— miles, and with heavy wagons tho papa roads become practically impassable during the winter. One great service the railway will perform, if it .does 'nothing else, and that its to bring metal to the mctallesa Northern Main ,lrunk country. FROM TRAM TO RAIL. The story of the western end of the line may be told briefly. It was started over eleven years ago from Stratford, though the original route surveyed made the junction at Ngaere, with a fairly level run to Toko. Residents of Eltham etill maintain that the diversion of tho line to Stratford was the result of pique on tho part of the Premier (Mr. Seddon), who just previously had been given a very hostile reception at a political meeting in, the Eltham Town Hall. However that may be, the line originally designed as an alternative for the present Mam Trunk, and for years and years strongly advocated in preference to the Central route by Aucklanders and the late Mr. E. M. Smith, M.P., became a light tram-railway from Stratford to Toko. It was built when Mr. HallJones, the Minister for Public W.orks, was ' seized with the advisability, of economising by making all new branch lines practical light tramways. His ideas on this subject were set forth in the Publio Works Statements of tho time. BETTER HEADWAY LATELY. Slowly the line was pushed ahead from Toko over a fairly easy but swampy sorb of country until it began to strike the rough ridges towards (the pupa belt. In the meantime ib was thought desirable to relay in heavier metals the StraitfordToko light section, then served by a tinyi contractor's type of engine and a couple of venerable carriages. The completion of the Main Trunk m 1908 threw a large number of trained railway workers out of employment, and a large number of these drifted to Tarauaki and the Whanga railway, which began to be pushed on more quickly. Mr. Furkert, to whose resource ana enterprise the Main Trunk owes something for its completion as soon as it was, took charge, and things have progressed with compai'a. tive rapidity since. Mr. Furkort's energy may be ynderstood when he rides a bicycle right through from the Main Trunk to Stratford. The writer has covered tho grotind by coach,' on foot, and horseback, and ib was bad enough then; bub cycling !— — "WHANGA" AND AFTER. ■ The rails, then, on the western side are through to Wkangamomona. From that place there is much difficult work in front of the builders for the next thirty miles. Some forty odd miles from Stratford the Tahora saddle is crossed into the Tangarakau Valley. Two tunnels will be needed, a quarter of a mUe apart, one 24 chains in length and' the other 12 .chains. Then ttheMoki saddle will have to bo tackled, and here another and much longer tunnel will be necessary to keep the grades. After this comes the Tanga. rakau, where more tunnelling will be required to save some of the sharper bends. Three 'miles will be .saved, according to estimates, by a tunnel about a mile long. Between the Tangarakau and the Ohura or Mangaroa Valley there .is another divide to be traversed, and here again the country is still the feame broken papa, though nob so bad as further west. From the entrance to the Ohura Valley to the dividing range, between the' Ohura and the Ongarue, the railway will find the going comparatively easy and the country good. At this end. work is already in progress. Service roads a.i l 6 being made, and the approach from the Main Trunk at Okahukara cut to the mouth of tho milo-long tunnel under tho ridge. A LONG JOB STILL. It would be has&rdouß, in view of the history of the Main Trunk lino, to predict the date of the completion of this east and -west line, Main Trunk to Tararniki, Both the tunnels and the viadncta across tho Tangamkau and the general inaccessibility of, the country, through its metallCßß roads, ttvo years would ba the least p6saiblQ time to allow for completion. Ab it will bo a paying line, however, this Rhould certainly be some inducomonl lo tho Government of the day lo pntih it ahead with all speed. It not only opens up communication with a vasb area ofuseful country, already partially Mettled, but it will give accesn to tlio Tttugaraitau Gorge, one of the finest, pieces of natural scenery in tho Dominion, Thin, happily, in reserved from tho destroying use \\xd firebrand of the Bottler. Tho rest of the country is teomintf with interest for the visitor desirous of seeing tho nrogresß of settlement in a now country. Thuuuh not of tho grandeur of tho Central Main Trunk, with its mountains and forests, it has a decided and peculiar charm of ils own in its secluded 1 and Requcßloved bushy dolls and xUm and it« silent, dark rivors and, bold \v!iK\! i>Ms far übove. It in a country woll v>:th the seeing for anybody who likes to cct away frptn tho main track..