EAST COAST RAILWAY

Evening Post, Volume CXXII, Issue 22, 25 July 1936, Page 10

EAST COAST RAILWAY

WORK RESUMED

A SCENIC ROUTE

BLUFFS AND GORGES

ENGINEERING PROBLEMS

(Prom "The Post's" Special Reporter.)

The recommencement of the work of pushing the East Coast railway through from Waikokopu to Gishorne is hailed with delight hy the residents and producers of a very large district, which has hitherto been somewhat isolated. Getting a start after the lapse of five years' is not so simple a matter as it might seem, and activities at the moment are scattered, but from what could he seen by a trip through the country en route, and a visit to accessible parts of the line, the railway will have great scenic possibilities, and prove well with the construction, especially in view of the fact that what remains to be done can represent only a small proportion of the money already sunk in the line.

One of the reasons why Poverty Bay had the commencement of its railway deferred in the past, while in other parts of the country railways probably less needed were being built in rapid succession, was that part, if not the greater part, of the country to be traversed presented engineering problems only equal to those encountered on the Otago Central railway over much of the route, and in places problems that were unique, such as the Mohaka Viaduct and the rough coastal country from Waikokopu onwards.

The part of the railway completed, from Napier to Wairoa, except for the laying of about six and a half miles of rail from Putorino onwards, has a number of small tunnels, and one half a mile long, and at least four big viaducts, but the engineering difficulties over that section are as nothing to those which will be encountered in the section from Waikokopu to Gisborne. In this portion of the line a good deal of formation work was done when the construction of the line was. stopped in January, 1931, in fact the pushing on of the work rapidly on the line as a whole meant that gangs were working in many places at the same time. A PERPLEXING POSITION. It would be quite an accounting problem to assess the actual extent of all the formation work done up to the closing-down date, as much of it has been only half finished, and this applies especially to cuttings and fillings. One comes across a short completed tunnel, looking out on dense manuka, dated 1926, with only formation works leading up to it, and no sign of rails. Near Putorino are men loading rails on their way to a spot near Chimney Creek beyond Maungaturango Viaduct, which lies well on the far side of the Mohaka River, where the erection of the largest viaduct in New Zealand has only just been resumed. The Maungaturango Viaduct, on the other hand, like the Waikare and Matahoura Viaducts, all major engineering works, was completed years ago. It is strange and perplexing to come on rusty railway crossings and lifeless stations, and very difficult at first to realise that there is no level-crossing danger, though this is borne in upon the motorist when he sees sheep and cows grazing happily together on the long grass between the rails in some cutting. Just how much has been lost by the stoppage of the work is difficult to say. The rails laid have not deteriorated, bridges, buildings, and retained plant have all been regularly painted, and the formation work done has not been lost. Probably the greatest loss was the forced sale of material, such as sleepers, hutments, and gear of various kinds, and next to this will probably come the time lost in picking up the threads of the lost system. OVERHAULING THE MACHINE. Though the work looks haphazard, the connecting links are all on record, and as in many cases old hands have been re-engaged, systematised effort will soon make sense out of chaos. There is the difficulty that many men experienced in such work who were at their prime six years ago are now a little past it, while in the interval, in that district at any rate, others have not been trained. During the depression many drifted into other occupations. Soon, no doubt, trained rockwork men, platelayers, and other essential workers will be forthcoming. Quite a lot, of small slips have occurred in cuttings and on steep faces. In these the earthquake assisted. Taken all in all the most difficult task will be in clearing up the tattered threads of former activities. Gangs must be housed, and the right stamp of worker found. The contract system, at one time decried by Labour, probably because of the rates paid, has now come into its own, and the leaners on shovels in the vertical position will now find it hard to get into any gang on the East Coast Railway. Already there is a great deal of scattered work being done, and soon there will be no uncompleted part of the line where there are not men working. SCENIC APPEAL. Apart from the many big tunnels and viaducts, the railway will have a scenic value. The limestone country north of Napier, mountainous and picturesque, gives place further on to sandstone and pumice, in which there are staggering gorges, abruptly come upon with quite a thrill. Then the country near Wairoa is pleasingly varied. All the way from Napier to Wairoa the rolling pastoral country is interspersed with hills that would be mountains in England, and in the winter the summits cf many of them in the background are covered with snow. Bleak though some of the higher sheep country is, the coastal flats are so temperate that they verge on the sub-tropical in summer, as oranges in home gardens, and mnay plants that, would not survive in Wellington, show.

It is from the terminus of the six-and-a-half-mile now isolated line from Wairoa to Waikokopu onwards, however, that the railway tourist will get the greatest thrills, He will miss the road climb over Tarewa summit, 1660 ft, which is a scenic treat only on fine days, but he will have instead the privilege of seeing some almost unique railway engineering problems overcome, and will pop out of tunnels to suddenly come on wonderful sweeps of coastline buttressed by titanic sandstone bluffs. This line in parts will be almost a succession of small tunnels, with some larger ones thrown in, the longest 123 chains, and, though it will not have the imposing viaducts of the Napier-Wairoa section, Nature will supply this deficiency by introducing the visitor to the most jumbled mass of steep, inhospitable spurs pronging straight down into the sea imaginable. Some of them are very little short of being vertical, and as the big*ones range up to 1800 ft above tunnels, the scenic effect and mild thrills combined should attract tourists. It is a towering, wild, and rugged stretch of seaboard, inhabited at present only by