PROGRESSIVE NELSON

Nelson Evening Mail, Volume LXX, 17 June 1936, Page 11

PROGRESSIVE NELSON

(To The Editor) Sir, —I can’t allow the Hole in the Hill to be an accomplished fact without a parting shot. Yes; Nelson all over: so long as we can get something out of the other fellow we will waste any quantity of the ratepayers’ money —some £25,000, more or less, out of the Consolidated Fund, and on goes the game. Pleased to see the broad view being taken to assist our sisters in the country by all means, but why not take the longer view and get water for all the farms on' the Waimea Plains when we are at it? I may inform the powers that be that there is not a single farm on the Waimea Plains to-day that is not short of water ;in fact, in many cases • carting water, and this is the middle of winter. Sheep and cattle are suffering because the Government has introduced the forty-hour week and put up the wages to such an extent that at the present price of land, not the value, the farmer can’t possibly afford to pay the extra expenses incurred and therefore stock must suffer, and, of course, more farmers driven off their land or the other fellow’s land, it does not matter which. The Government has promised a sum of £25,000, but they could just as easy, they tell us, make it £IOO,OOO, because it costs them nothing under this new scheme of costless credit system, which will, they say, solve all our troubles and the money mystery and go to the Wairoa River, put in a dam not far from the mouth of the Gorge, generate all the electricity we will require for the next hundred years, and send the surplus over to the Cobb Development Scheme; water all the farms, market gardens included, and then we will have Nelson on the map. Some will say the fall is not enough, but pumping can be done into our reservoirs at Nelson and Richmond, also one still to be erected on the Port Hills for Tahuna in the night time for the nights.will be longer now the forty-hour week is in force, while no power is required and the greatest argument is the employment of pick and shovel men, some 300, more or less, in Council employ all the time instead of, say, four experts per shift, that can be placed to bore the Hole in the Hill, and they must be imported to Nelson from outside. Then we are told New Zealand gets a fair share at intervals, be they long or short between times, and Nelson is somewhere near the fault line, they say. “What a disaster to have our Hole in the Hill blocked just at the time we most want it. Of course, we have our natural water supply, the Maitai, running through the City, but what of the others, Tahuna, Stoke, Richmond and the farmers? We could well afford at this time to take a lesson from the Yanks —put in some dam, our officials could reduce that American scheme to suit our own creek, lessen the flood damage on the Plains, for we get our rain here in Nelson in lumps, not distributed over the year by Nature. That part is left for us to accomplish. Yes, push Nelson ahead by all means, but for the life of me I cannot see why a few people should waste their energies thinking or dreaming of a bridge across the sea to Mapua. In the Old Country and Europe, where we fought, we saw where they had dug canals and water- '■ ways at great costs in order to get cheaper transport. Here, where we; have the canal we want to put a bridge across. Well, it takes arithmetic or something else to prove to me its value I can’t say who originated the two schemes I have mentioned, but theirs is a case to be pitied. In conclusion, Mr Editor, lam pleased to see the City Fathers are going to put in a steam plant at the Hower House. I was afraid they might get oil from America to operate our forty-hour week and give work and money to the Yankee instead of looking after our own people.—l am, otc JAMES WYLLIE. Nelson, 13th June. P.S. —Since handing in the above epistle a very interesting letter has appeared in your paper under “Electric Power,” and without doubt penned by someone with engineering training or tutored by an engineer. One addition the writer overlooked and which should have been installed when the plant was first erected, was an economiser. This would increase the capacity of the existing boilers by 25 per cent, and see us over our troubles for a considerable time. No doubt the officers in charge realise this, and in fact provision is made for same. The greatest mistake in cur Power House is the general layout of the plant. The boilers should have been erected at right angles to the sea and a temporary wall left at the end next the Cool Store for extentions to battery when required. Scows would then have been able to discharge coal straight behind each set of boilers and thus eliminate all the- present coal trimming gear and cost of extra handling. This was pointed out to the then City Mayor and also consulting engineers for the time being, and all the satisfaction to be got was “we must be guided by our expert”—much too common an answer. However, I have not the slightest doubt that the city engineering staff are well aware of this great economy whereby the local North Cape coal would then well cope with the position and thereby increase our local industries, the only lasting method of pushing Nelson ahead. The lately formed 30,000 team would be well advised to keep this method foremost in their minds; 30,000 people are no use here twiddling their fingers. We have a much more useful purpose to serve to humanity in general given us here in Nelson than to be a purely residential district or city.—J.W. 16th June.