The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 24, 1925. EXPANSION LEAGUE’S YEAR.

Evening Star, Issue 19001, 24 July 1925, Page 6

The Evening Star FRIDAY, JULY 24, 1925. EXPANSION LEAGUE’S YEAR.

Pertinacity is a quality which appeals to our sporting instinct. It is undoubtedly possessed by the Otago Expansion League. Thirteen years ago it came into existence because its promoters realised that a fight would have to be waged against the relative retrogression of this province. Centralisation is liable to be a menace to the outlying parts if they are content to stand by and watch its operation. And besides the effects of centralisation of administration in Wellington there has developed centralisation of overseas transport in the North Island. The league has striven hard in the opposite direction, expansion; and gradually it is becoming able to point to results. Its annual report admits the difficulty and slowness of past achievement. For example, there is the deviation and duplication of the Dunedin-Ravens-bourne section of railway. This was one of the initial objectives of the league, and it has only now become an actual fact. In season and out of season it was made the subject of appeal and remonstrance to tho Government and the railway authorities. And it is a work which has made possible other improvements, a share of the credit for which the league can justly claim. Without the deviation the approach to the Exhibition grounds would have been mean and cramped. Besides the driving force tho league has been to tho whole Exhibition project, it has been a chief means in securing the permanent improvements that will remain to the city in the wake of

the Exhibition. But the league docs not remain on its oars in contemplation of that. The Duncdin-Eavorm-j bourne duplication in its primary aspect was hut part of a railway imi provomont that was to extend further than “just round the corner.” In a recent programme of improvements the I railway authorities omitted to recognise this. Instantly the league was again on the warpath. It has secured a promise that the duplication is to go as far as Burkes, and the past history of tho longue ensures that vigilance will bo unceasing until it does. Vigilance has at last been rewarded in tho prospect of the speedy completion of the railway to Lawrence, but the league has already found a new outlet for its energies towards the railroading of Otago. It has put its force behind the movement, now just becoming articulate, for mating Cromwell but a roadside station on a lino up the Upper Clutha Valley, This is a task of greater magnitude than any the league has yet set itself in tho sphere of railroading. The first material obstacle, the bridging of tho Clutha River, will bo the greatest. But there is an even greater abstract difficulty to bo overcome in the inertia of politicians—possibly even tho active antagonism of the North Islanders. Fortunately, there is in favor of tho movement the fact that Mr Coates, as Minister of Public "Works, knows Central Otago, and has given proof of his belief in it by the expenditure he has already made towards its development. In the sphere of transport the league’s offices have been of use also in getting the Highways Board to declare tho Duncclin-Waitati road a Government road, giving the public the near prospect of the remedying of what at one time seemed hopeless. Tho league is still zealous for a measure of decentralisation in the splitting of the highways administration into two boards, one for each island. It has seen obstinacy eventually crumble before pea!* tinacity over other subjects, and here again it is the reverse of despondent, counting it already as one of its future achievements, not merely an aim. “It will not he,” says tho report, “ the first improvement which has eventually been granted after being refused many times, and if the league still adheres to its policy and asks persistently and pertinently enough it will eventually secure the improvement it desires.” This confidence should bo noted, by tho way, by those who oppose tho nitrate scheme in Milford Sound, for the league is not taking tip a neutral attitude on this matter. In the report considerable space is occupied in urging the benefits of tho scheme from the tourist point of view as well as the commercial. It is complained that “the unfortunate policy which has been pursued by successive Governments of making tho Tourist Department tho Cinderella of New Zealand, and failing to grasp the idea that money wisely spent upon tourist resorts brings back a hundredfold to tho community, proves that such resvrls as Milford will never be accessible to tho great bulk of our people.” But, if our information is correct, in this case it is tho Tourist Department itself which blocks the proposed way of popularising Milford Sound. The Expansion League him .already tried the tactics of attrition on other and larger Government departments not without success. It may have to bring its machinery to boar on this ono, too, and is likely to find officialdom highly resistant.