ELECTRIC RAILWAYS

Hawera Star, Volume XLIX, 21 January 1930, Page 2

ELECTRIC RAILWAYS

■ CITY SUBURBAN LINES. AUCKLAND’ AND WELLINGTON. (By Telegraph—Press Association.) AUCKLAND, Jan. 20. Commenting on the Government’s decision adverse to the luorningside tunnel project, Mr J. G. Coates said he thought it inevitable that the railways should be electrified north and south as far as Helensville and Pukekohe, unless the railway policy was to be to sit down' and do nothing. The Reform Government had always contemplated electrification and it would have been kept in the ten years’ programme he •had roughly worked out. The electrified lines would pay without any growth in the present traffic. Messrs Merz and MeLellan, consult-; ing engineers of London, in a report to the Government in 192 G, said the annual saving due to the electrification of, the increased services would be sufficient to pay approximately 10 per cent, •on the capital expenditure of Auckland and Si per cent, of Wellington. Mr Coates* thought it could be shown definitely that it would pay to electrify .the following sections of line: Auckland -Hel on s v ill e; Auckland - Pukekohe; Wellington-Upper Hutt; WellingtonPaekakariki. Thdre must be a comprehensive scheme making it attractive for people to- use the electrified lines, as had been done in the Hutt Valley.