RAILWAYS

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume IV, Issue 220, 18 September 1869, Page 2

RAILWAYS

The subject of a new railway . from Christchurch to the banks of. the river Ashley is beiug ventilated in Canterbury. The Lyttelton Times, in advocating tbe scheme, says : — If we take into consideration the very considerable population to the north of the Waimakariri, amounting to over 8000 souls at the census of 1867, and the tendency ot railways to create traffic, we shall see that so far as passenger traffic is concerned the line would promise well. The traveller along the north road meets at least as many persons botween Christchurch aud Kaiapoi as he would have done between Christchurch and Lyttelton before the opeuing of the tuunel. Of course, a railway from Christchurch to the north would not increase the passenger traffic in such an enormous ratio as the tunnel has increased the traffic between Christchurch aud Lyttelton, but there can be no doubt that, it would inrrease it very largely. The Southern Railway shows how railways create traffic. Our readers are aware that a very few miles out of Christchurch it enters upon poor land, and that for the last ten miles it traverses a wilderness. They will be probably surprised to learn that for the six months ending June the 30th, the Southern Railway carried nearly thirty thousand passengers. The month j of January and April were certainly exceptional, as races took place in both mouths, and swelled the traffic, but the number of passengers in February, Marcb, May, and June, which may be taken as a tolerably fair average, amounted to 11,300, producing a revenue of about £1500, or at the rate of 33,900 passengers a year, yielding a gross sum of £4500. If this result can be obtained by a line, that runs through a sparsely-populated district, and leads to nowhere, what may we expect from a line that for its whole length runs through a fertile country, and connects a large population with the capital and the port?