NORTHERN RAILWAYS

New Zealand Herald, Volume XLV, Issue 13709, 27 March 1908, Page 4

NORTHERN RAILWAYS

The Auckland Railways League deputation did not obtain .a very great amount of satisfaction from the Prime Minister, when they waited upon, him yesterday, in order /to . urge the claims of our provincial railways. The approaching completion of the Main Trunk Line was very naturally put forward by the Prime Minister as creditable to the Government,; and we need not grudge acknowledgment, of this even while no ! 'Aucklander can forget the manner in which for many years it was made subordinate to ; comparatively unimportant constructions in other parts of the country.. As for the. East Coast and the. Helcnsville Northward, it was officially admitted—what is incontestable—that it would pay the country to push them along. But there are too many lines being completed in the South which would never be built upon their merits for any great encouragement to be forthcoming for Auckland schemes which would not only be profitable as railways, bUt would open iip large areas to settlement. 1 - The gap between Kawakawa and Hukerenui is to be closed—being a little one ; but the gap between "the Ilotorua and the Gisborne lines will remain open for an v indefinite period. As there is some three-quarters .of a million sterling to be spent in railway construction for. 1908-0, it is plain that no decisive steps are yet to be taken to equalise the great disproportion between Northern and Southern railway mileages. ,