LUGGAGE TRANSPORT

Evening Post, Volume CXXVI, Issue 151, 23 December 1938, Page 10

LUGGAGE TRANSPORT

THOUSANDS OF TONS

WHEN EFFICIENCY COUNTS

Human freight is not the only concern of transport services during these busy days. Tens of thousands of travellers will enter and leave Wellington during Christmas and New ¥ear period and the luggage accompanying them requires almost as much care &s its owners. At the invitation of the Railway Department an "Evening Post representative was permitted this morning to watch in operation the smooth working organisation that sees to the handling of luggage between the South and North Island railway systems- via the Lyttelton steamer express service Running night and daylight trips during the rush periods, the inter-isiand express steamers are making, the best possible time between the two ports and the Wahine was backing towards her berth at the Ferry Wharf this morning not long after 6 o'clock. A fleet of Railway Department lorries were already on the wharf, and the men required to handle the luggage were waiting in the shelter of the wharf shed. The luggage staff went into action with startling suddenness. The vessel was still moving ahead when a shout of "Mind your head" caused bystanders to duck. A bundle of papers thrown by the purser from the upper deck of the Wahine shot through the air to land neatly at the feet of the railway official in charge of operations. He scanned them rapidly. "Three hundred and five check and 120 for Wellington," he said. Before the passenger gangway was in place and while mooring lines were still being fixed the ship's winches rattled into action bringing the first slingful of suitcases and trunks from the forward hold. No sooner had the sling reached the wharf than the waiting men sprang upon the heap of bags from all sides. Luggage bound for stations north of Wellington was shot on to a lorry and the man stacking them called out each number to enable it to be ticked off on the list at a desk I nearby. Luggage checked to Wellington was laid out in rows in the shed in case passengers desired to claim it on the wharf. Later all unclaimed baggage was transferred to the railway station. AT RAILWAY STATION. As soon as the first lorry was loaded it was driven to the railway station so that its load could be further sorted in readiness for transfer to the various trains. No time was lost because most of the bags were bound for Main Trunk stations, and had to be placed aboard the express leaving at 8.15 a.m. The sorting at the station was done speedily and efficiently. Several luggage trolleys, each in charge of a porter, were drawn up in a semf-circle near the lorry, and as the address of each bag was called out it was placed on the appropriate trolley for transfer to the van of its particular train. While all this inward luggage was being dealt with a separate staff was attending to luggage bound for the South Island. Here again speed was necessary because the Wahine was due to sail for Lyttelton at 8 a.m., and all checked baggage had to be listed and loaded on the vessel before that hour. Every available man has had to be pressed into" service in the railway goods and luggage departments today, and long hours of overtime will have to be worked. An official said that the general efficiency of the whole system was indicated by the fewness of mistakes and the very small number of genuine complaints that had to be dealt with.